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/ 

THE 

GERMANIA OF TACITUS, 



ETHNOLOGICAL DISSERTATIONS 

AND NOTES. 



By R. G.° LATHAM, M.D., F.R.S., 

LATE FELLOW OF KING'S COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE, MEMBER OF THE ETHNOLOGICAL 
SOCIETY, NEW YORK. 



LONDON: 
TAYLOR, WALTON, AND MABERLY, 

UPPER GOWER STREET, AND FVT LANE, PATERNOSTER ROW. 

1851. 



U>^M , 






LONDON: 

Printed by Samuel Bentley and Co., 
Bangor House, Shoe Lane. 



PREFACE. 



The methods of ethnological investigation in the 
present volume are best collected from the text. 

The result is a Germany of very different magni- 
tude from that of the usual commentators. 

If this be unsatisfactory, there is still some gain to 
the cause of scholarship. 

The extent to which migrations may be unneces- 
sarily assumed, or reasonably dispensed with, is mea- 
sured ; so that, to draw a comparison from the exact 
sciences, an ethnological work without great migra- 
tions is like a geometry without axioms. 

The extent of the difficulties and assumptions of the 
existing belief as to the magnitude of ancient Ger- 
many may also be measured. 

The value I put upon the great writers of Germany 
on the same subject — Zeuss, Grimm, Niebuhr — is not 
thus measured. 

I rarely mention except to differ with them. 

As a set-off to this, I may add that, it is almost 
wholly by means of their own weapons that they are 
combated. 

Whether the present work took its present form, or 



IV PREFACE. 

that of a translation of Zeuss's learned and indispen- 
sable work,* with an elaborate commentary, was a 
mere question of convenience. 

To it I am under the same obligations as the 
learner of a language is to his grammar, his lexicon, 
or his text-book ; and it is not saying too much to 
add that nineteen out of twenty of the references and 
quotations are Zeuss's. 

What applies to Zeuss applies, in a less degree, to 
Grimm and Niebuhr. 

Nevertheless, though the materials are the same, 
the structure is as different as a ship is from a barn, or 
vice versa, both built from the same forest. 

That the present results have taken a completely 
definite and systematic form is more than I think. 

Everything in ethnology is a balance between con- 
flicting difficulties, and I can only hope that I have 
approached a full and complete exhibition of the 
ethnology of ancient Germany. 

Perhaps, too, the work is rather a commentary upon 
the geographical part of the Germania, than on the 
Germania itself — the purely descriptive part relating 
to the customs of the early Germans being passed 
over almost sicco pede. 

The real difficulties lay in the geography, and the 
classificational portion of the ethnology ; besides which 
it is there where I worked with the most confidence. 

The chief texts are given in full. To have fol- 

* Die Deutschen und Die Nachbarstdmme. 

The Deutsche Mythologie, of Grimm, is quoted as D. M. 
The Deutsche Sprache as D. S. 



PREFACE. v 

lowed them up with the same amount of commentary 
as is attached to the text of Tacitus, would have 
trebled the size of the work. In the case of Jornandes 
and Paulus Diaconus there has been an additional 
reason for giving the chief passages at large. The 
evidently heterogeneous character of their notices 
and remarks is intended to exhibit, in a practical 
point of view, their value as authorities. 

In one respect I may appear to have understated 
the case that can be made out by the advocates of 
what may be called the German theory in its broadest 
form. One of the strong arms of their argument is, 
the etymological deduction of names like Snevi, Lygii, 
&c, from supposed German roots. Specimens of 
these derivations may be found incidentally through- 
out the work. In the eyes of such readers as they 
satisfy, I have done less than justice to the views of 
their devisers. But, if the samples* in question be 
(as they are believed to be) fair specimens of the 
whole, I have but little fear that the neglect of them 
will lay me open to the charge of keeping back any 
very valid arguments on the opposite side. 

It should be added that the order in which 
the different geographical and national names of the 
Epilegomena are taken is what may be called logical, 
i.e., those populations which illustrate each other, and 
which are subject to the same lines of criticism, are 
grouped together, sometimes (but not often) to the 
violation of geographical proximity, and ethnological 

* In the words Saxon, Frank, Dulgibini, Nuithones, and others. 



VI PREFACE. 

affinity. Thus the Juthungi and Jutes, the Franks 
and Varangi are noticed in succession. This is not 
because they are really connected, but because they 
are most conveniently considered when thrown in 
such groups. 

Being unwilling that it should appear to be Tacitus, 
rather than his commentators, whose authority I im- 
pugn, I must remind the reader, that the question is 
not whether certain nations of the Germania are 
rightly placed therein, but whether Tacitus's test of 
Germanism was the same as ours ; and whether, if 
different, more correct. Two populations who, ac- 
cording to his own showing, would not be German 
in the eyes of a modern ethnologist, are especially 
stated to have been so in his — viz., the Osi and the 
jEstii, and I only urge the probability of the Lygii 
and others being in the same predicament. 



CONTENTS. 



PROLEGOMENA. 

PAGE 

§ i. Present distribution of families and nations descended from, or 

allied to, the Germans of Tacitus .... i 

N. § ii. Different stages of the different languages of the families and 

nations descended from, or allied to, the Germans of Tacitus . iii 
§ in. On the classification of the preceding forms of speech. — The 

term Gothic ...... vi 

§ iv. On the value of language as a test of Ethnological relation- 
ship ........ ix 

§ v. Present distribution and classification of families and nations 

descended from, or allied to, the Sarmatse of Tacitus . xi 

§ vi. On the date of the diffusion of the Russian language over 

Russia ........ xiv 

"\ § vn. Distribution of the families and nations descended from, or 

allied to, the Sarmatee of Tacitus in the ninth century . xv 

§ vm. On the assumptions necessary to reconcile the usual interpre- 
tations of Tacitus with the state of things in the seventh, eighth, 
ninth, tenth, and eleventh centuries .... xxv 

\ § ix. Ethnological classification of the remaining European popu- 
lations ....... xxxvi 

x § x. Valuation of Ethnological groups by the writers of antiquity . xxxvii 
§ xi. On certain isolated members of the German family — real or 

supposed ....... xxxix 

^» § xn. On the military and other colonies of the Germanic and non- 
Germanic areas ....... xliii 

§ xiii. Germanic area of Tacitus . . . . xlv 

§ xiv. Certain modern additions to the Germanic area of Tacitus . xlvi 
§ xv. On native and foreign names .... xlviii 

§ xvi. Limitations in the way of Etymology . . . Ii 

§ xvii. On the term Marcomanni . . . liii 

§ xvm. Irregularity of size of Ethnological areas . . . lvi 

^*§ xix. Caesar's notices of the Germans . . . . lvii 

§ xx. Arminius and Maroboduus ..... lxxxix 

§ xxi. Strabo's notice of Germany .... cxviii 

§ xxii. Notice of Germany from Pomponius Mela . . . exxvi 

§ xxin. Pliny's notice of Germany .... exxvii 



VI u 



CONTENTS. 



THE TEXT AND NOTES. 









PAGE 




PAGE 


§ v. Text .... 


32 


5 i. Text . 


. 1 


Notes .... 


33 


Notes 


1 


Silvis horrida 


33 


Ger mania 


. 1 


Fa opes sunt . 


33 


Omnis — separatur 


6 


Serratos, Bigatosque 


34 


Gallis . 


. 6 


§ vi. Text .... 


34 


Rhcetis 


9 


Notes .... 


35 


Pannoniis 


. 11 


Nejerrum quidem super est 


35 


Rheno 


13 


Frameas 


39 


Danubio 


. 14 


Nomen et honor 


42 


Fluminibus . 


14 


§ vii. Text . . . 


42 


Sarmatis 


. 16 


Notes .... 


42 


Dacis . 


17 


Reges ex nobilitate 


42 


Montibus 


. 17 


Duces .... 


43 


Alpium 


17 


Sacerdotibus 


43 


Abnoba . 


. 18 


Families et propinquitates 


44 


Plures populos 


18 


§ vm. Text .... 


44 


§n. Text 


. 19 


Note . 


45 


Notes . 


19 


Veledam 


45 


Nee terra olim, fyc. . 


. 19 


§ ix. Text .... 


45 


Carminibus . 


22 


Notes .... 


45 


Tuistonem 


. 24 


Mercurium 


45 


Mannum 


25 


Humanis — hostiis 


49 


Ingavones 


. 26 


Herculem 


50 


Hermiones . 


26 


Martem 


50 


Istavones 


. 27 


Pars Suevorum — Isidi sa- 




Marsos 


27 


crijicat 


51 


Gambrivios 


. 27 


Cohibere parietibus deos 


55 


Suevos. 


27 


§ x. Text .... 


56 


Vandulios 


. 27 


Note .... 


57 


Germanise vocabulun 


recens 27 


Auspicia sortesque, Sfc. 


57 


Herculem . 


28 


§ xi. Text .... 


57 


§ m. Text 


. 28 


Notes . 


58 


Notes 


28 


Principes . 


58 


Barditum 


. 28 


Plebem .... 


58 


ASKIIIYPriON . 


30 


Noctium 


58 


§ iv. Text 


. 31 


§ xii. Text .... 


59 


Note . 


31 


Notes .... 


60 


Habitus — corporum . 


. 31 


Concilium 


60 



CONTENTS. 




IX 




PAGE 








PAQE 


Licet apud concilium accusare 60 


§ 


xxvi. Text 




74 


Panarum . 


60 




Notes 




75 


Pars multas 


60 




Fenus agitare 




75 


Centeni — comites . 


60 




Pro numero cultorum— 


-per 




§ xiii. Text 


62 




vices . 




75 


Note .... 


63 


§ 


xxvii. Text 




78 


Comitatus — comites 


63 




Note 




78 


§ xiv. Text .... 


63 




Crementur . 




78 


Note 


64 


§ 


xxviii. Text . 




78 


Civitas 


64 




Notes . 




79 


§ xv. Text 


64 




Validiores olim Gallorum res 79 


Note .... 


65 




Helve t ii 




84 


Venutibus 


65 




Igitur inter — Boiemi 


no- 




§ xvi. Text .... 


65 




men 




' 90 


Note 


66 




Aravisci . 




95 


Nullus — urbes 


66 




Osis, Germanorum natione 


95 


§ xvn. Text 


66 




Aravisci — ab Osis, Osi ab 




Note . ... 


66 




Araviscis 




96 


Per arum pelles 


66 




Treviri 




98 


§ xviii. Text 


67 




Nervii 




99 


Note 


68 




Vangiones . 




99 


Severa — matrimonia 


68 




Triboci . 




99 


§ xix. Text 


68 




Nemetes 




99 


Note .... 


69 




Ubii 




100 


Literarum stcreta — ignor 


mt 69 


§ 


xxix. Text 




100 


§ xx. Text .... 


69 




Notes 




101 


Note 


. 70 




Batavi 




101 


Serajuvenum Venus 


70 




Mattiacorum 




102 


§ xxi. Text 


. 70 




Decumates agros . 




102 


Note .... 


71 




Limite ado 




104 


Suscipere — inim icitias 


. 71 


§ 


xxx. Text . 




104 


§ xxn. Text 


71 




Notes 




105 


Note 


. 72 




Chatti 




105 


Lavantur 


72 




Hercynio saltu 




107 


§ xxiii. Text 


. 72 


§ 


xxxi. Text 




108 


Note .... 


72 




Note .... 




109 


Humor ex hordeo aut fru 






Crinem barbamque summit- 




mento — corruptus 


. 72 




tere 




109 


§ xxiv. Text 


72 


§ 


xxxii. Text . 




110 


Note 


. 73 




Notes . 




110 


Voluntariam servitutem 


73 




Usipii 




110 


§ xxv. Text . 


. 73 




Tencteri 




110 


Notes .... 


73 


§ 


xxxin. Text . 




111 


Suam quisque sedem 


. 73 




Notes . 




111 


Libertini 


74 




Bructeri 




111 





CONTENTS. 






PAGE 




PAGE 


Chamavos . 


. 112 


hi Herwtinduris Albis ori- 




Angrivarios . 


. 113 


tur 


148 


xxxiv. Text 


115 


§ xlii. Text .... 


149 


Notes 


. 115 


Notes 


149 


A tergo Dulgibini et Cha- 


Hermunduros 


149 


suari 


. 115 


Narisci . 


151 


Dulgibini 


. 115 


Marcomanni 


153 


Chasuari 


. 116 


Qiiadi 


154 


Frisii 


. 116 


§ xliii. Text 


154 


Majoribus minoribusque 125 


Notes 


155 


xxxv. Text 


. 126 


Marsigni 


155 


Note 


. 126 


Gothini . 


156 


Chaucorum gens . . ] 26 


Gallica — lingua . 


156 


xxxvi. Text 


. 128 


Osi 


157 


Notes 


. 129 


Burn .... 


157 


Cherusci 


. 129 


Lygiorum nomen 


158 


Fosi 


. 132 


Arii — Manimi — Elysii 


160 


xxx vii. Text 


. 132 


Helveconas 


. 160 


Notes . 


. . 133 


Naharvalos . 


160 


Cimbri . 


. 133 


Muliebri ornatu 


. 161 


Veteris fama— 


-vestigia 135 


Interpretatione Romand 


161 


xxxviii. Text 


. 136 


Castorem Pollucemque 


. 161 


Note 


. 136 


Alcis .... 


161 


Suevis . 


. 136 


Gotkones 


162 


xxxix. Text . 


. 137 


Rugii .... 


162 


Note 


. 137 


' Lemovii . 


162 


Semnones 


. 137 


§ xliv. Text .... 


163 


xl. Text . 


. 138 


Note ..... 


164 


Notes 


. 139 


Suionum 


164 


Langobardos 


. 139 


§ xlv. Text 


164 


Reudigni 


. 142 


Notes .... 


166 


Aviones 


. 142 


Aliud mare pigrum . 


. 166 


Angli 


. 143 


Radios capitis 


166 


Varini 


. 143 


Suevici maris . 


. 166 


Eudoses . 


. 144 


■ A^stiorum gentes . 


166 


Suardones . 


144 


Lingua Britannica propior 171 


Nuithones 


. 144 


• Sitonum — femina domina 




Herthum, id 


est Terram 


tur 


. 174 


matrem 


. 145 


§ xlvi. Text 


175 


Insula 


. 145 


Notes 


176 


Oceano . 


. 145 


Peucini — Bastarnas 


176 


xli. Text . 


... 148 


Venedi . 


. 178 


Notes 


. 148 


- Fennosque . 


178 


Hermundurori 


m civitas 148 


Hellusios et Oxionas 


179 



CONTENTS. 



EPILEGOMENA. 



§ i. The date of the Germania, as compared with the other works of 



Tacitus. — Germanic populations mentioned in the Annals 

History, hut not in the Germania 
§ ii. The Dea Tacfana . 
§ in. The Dea Hludana 
§ iv. The notice of Germany in Ptolemy 
§ v. Extracts from Jornandes de Rebus Geticis 
§ vi. Extract from Paulus Diaconus de Gestis Longobardorum 
§ vii. The Traveller's Song . 
§ viii. The Goths- 
§ ix. The Visigoths . 
§ x. The Ostrogoths 
§ xi. The Alemanni 
§ xn. The Burgundians . 
§ xni. The Burgundiones of Pliny . 
§ xiv. The Franks 
§ xv. The Salii 
§ xvi. The Ripuarii 
§ xvii. The Varangians 
§ xviii. The Russi ('Pws) 
§ xix. The Chattuarii 
§ xx. The Suevi 
§ xxi. The Ciuuari . 
§ xxii. The Armalausi . 
§ xxm. The Lentienses and Brisgavi 
§ xxiv. The Buccinobantes 
§ xxv. The Brigonenses 
§ xxvi. The Obii 

§ xxvu. The Langobardi of Lombardy 
§ xxviii. The Gepidae 
§ xxix. The Thaifake 
§ xxx. The Vandals 
§ xxxi. The Rugii . 
§ xxxn. The Heruli 
§ xxxin. The Brenti 
§ xxxiv. The Turcilingi 
§ xxxv. The Sciri . 
§ xxxvi. The Alani 
§ xxxvn. The Huns 
§ xxxviii. The Szeklers, Siculi, or Syssele (?) 



and 



CONTENTS. 



§ xxxix. The Rugii, Heruli, Turcilingi, and Sciri . 
§ xl. The Varni ..... 

§ xli. The Angli of Thuringia .... 

§ xlii. The Werini of Thuringia 
j§ xliii. The Ymbre ..... 

^ § xliv. The Teutones and Teutonarii 
§ xlv. The Jutes . . . . ... 

§ xlvi. The Nordalbingians .... 

§ xlvii. The Juthungi . . . 

§ xlviii. The Saxons ..... 

§ xlix. The Angli ...... 

§ l. The Danes ...... 

§ li. The Harudes ...... 

§ lii. The Sedusii ..... 

§ liii. The Cobandi, Phundusii, Sigulones, Sabalingii, and Chali 
§ liv. The Pharodini ..... 

§ lv. The Phirsesi (Qipaiaoi) .... 

§ lvi. The Danduti, Nertereanes, Curiones, Intuergi, Vargiones, 
Landi ...... 

§ lvii. The Batti and Subatti .... 

§ lviii. The Sturii, Marsaci, and Frisiabones 

§ lix. The Parmsecampi and Adrabsecainpi . 

§ lx. The Teracatrife and Racatse 

§ lxi. The Carini ...... 

§ lxii. The Vispi ..... 

§ lxiii. The NovatTres ..... 

§ lxiv. The Xavgot. KaovXaoi, KadvXnoi, Ka/x^iai/ot, 'Ajai^az/oi 
§ lxv. The AayKoaapyoi .... 

§ lxvi. The TeyKepoi, 'lyplaves, Kaptrvoi, and Tovpcovoi 
§ lxvii. On the relations of the Getas to India 
§ lxviii. On the Quasi-Germanic Gauls . 



PAGE 

civ 
civ 
cvii 
cvii 
cviii 
ex 
cxii 
cxii 
cxiii 
cxv 
cxviii 
exxiv 
exxvii 
exxix 
exxix 
exxix 
exxx 
and 

exxxi 

. exxxii 

exxxii 

exxxiii 

exxxiv 

exxxiv 

exxxiv 

. exxxv 

exxxv 

. exxxvi 

exxxvii 

exxxvii 

cxliv 



APPENDICES. 



Appendix I. Translation of Extract from Alfred . . cli 

Appendix II. Translation of the Traveller's Song . . cli 

Appendix III. On the Connection between the Teutones and Cimbri 

and the Chersonesus Cimbrica . . . . .civ 



THE "GERMANY" OF TACITUS 



ETHNOLOGICAL DISSERTATIONS 
AND NOTES. 



PROLEGOMENA. 

§ I. PRESENT DISTRIBUTION OP FAMILIES AND NATIONS DESCENDED 
FROM, OR ALLIED TO, THE GERMANS OP TACITUS. 

The basis of all ethnological reasoning is the existing state 
of things."* This we take as we find it, and by arguing 
backwards from effect to cause, arrive at the early history 
of the different divisions of the human species. 

At the present moment the distribution of the Germanic 
nations is very different from what it was in the fourth and 
fifth centuries ; in the fourth and fifth centuries it was dif- 
ferent from what it was in the time of Tacitus ; and in the 
time of Tacitus it was probably different from what it was 
at the beginning of the historical era. Earlier still, it was 
probably different again. 

The present distribution of the families and nations de- 
scended from, or allied to, the Germans of Tacitus extends as 
far eastward as Australia, and as far westward as North 
America ; as far north as Finmark, and as far south as New 
Zealand. 



* It is almost necessary to state that this characteristic of ethnological 
science is taken from Dr. Whewell's " Philosophy of the Inductive 
Sciences." 

h 



11 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

Branches of the same great class occur in all the quar- 
ters of the world ; in the Asiatic possessions of Great Bri- 
tain and Holland ; in America ; and at the Cape of Good 
Hope, in Africa; the Dutch and the English being the 
chief nations by whom the family has been extended in 
these parts. 

The migrations which have carried the Germanic popula- 
tions thus far, have taken place within the last four centuries, 
and belong to that stage in the history of mankind which 
followed the great geographical discoveries of the sixteenth 
century, the revival of ancient learning, and the evolution of 
modern science. The earlier migrations represent a wholly 
different social state. 

The present classification of the tribes and families in 
question is as follows. 

1. The Norwegians of Norway, the Swedes of Sweden, 
the Danes of Jutland and the Danish islands, together with 
the Icelanders of Iceland and the inhabitants of the Faroe 
Islands, constitute the first division ; a division which may 
conveniently be called the Scandinavian, or Norse. 

2. The Frisians of Friesland, Heligoland, and Sleswick 
constitute the second. 

3. The English of Great Britain, Ireland, and America, the 
third. 

4. The Dutch of Holland, and the Flemings of Flanders, 
a fourth. 

5. The .Low-Germans (or Piatt- Deutsch) of Sleswick, 
Holstein, parts of Hanover, Mecklenburg, and the Lower 
Rhine, the fifth. 

6. The High-Germans of Hesse, Franconia, Swabia, Ba- 
varia, Austria and Switzerland, the sixth. 

I am far, however, from considering the divisions as abso- 
lutely scientific. Their value is not uniform ; e.g., the 
Dutch and Flemings may fairly be placed in the same class 
with the Platt-Deutsch or Low Germans ; and such would 
have been done if their greater political importance had 
not given them a prominence on other grounds. 

All, then, that the previous divisions can do, is to serve as 
a groundwork for further investigation. 



PROLEGOMENA. hi 

In one point, however, the order is natural. It repre- 
sents the relationship, affinity, or affiliation between the six 
forms of speech ; so that the Norse dialects are the most 
like the Frisian, the Frisian the English, the English the 
Dutch and Low German, and the Low German the High. 

§ II. DIFFERENT STAGES OF THE DIFFERENT LANGUAGES OF THE 
FAMILIES AND NATIONS DESCENDED FROM, OR ALLIED TO, THE 
GERMANS OF TACITUS. 

Some of the tongues just enumerated were reduced to 
writing many centuries ago. In this case we have specimens 
of them in an earlier stage of their growth ; the difference 
between the older and the newer forms of speech being, in 
many instances, sufficient to constitute a fresh language. 
Thus the English, jn its oldest known form, is Anglo-Saxon ; 
yet the Anglo-Saxon is so different from the present English 
as to be unintelligible to the unlearned reader. 

Again ; certain dialects, which were once cultivated, may 
have ceased to be spoken — have become extinct. In this case, 
we have an ancient tongue without any modern representa- 
tive; whereas, in certain provincial dialects, which have 
never been written at all, we have a modern form of speech, 
without any specimen of it during its earlier growth. All 
this introduces fresh objects of consideration, viz. : — the notice 
of the different stages of language, or the descent of one form 
of speech from another. 

When Tacitus mentions such nations as the Chauci and 
Cherusci, we are induced to ask whether any of the present 
populations may be their representatives or descendants ; and 
so on with the others. Or we may change the form of the 
inquiry, and, after enumerating such modern divisions as the 
English, the Dutch, or the High- German, may investigate 
their parentage, and ask what they each were at some earlier 
period of their respective histories. 

The descent of the Swedish, Norwegian, and Danish is 
from a language somewhat difficult to designate. It is the 
mother-tongue of the present Icelandic ; which, in the ninth 
century, seems to have been spoken, with but little variation, 



THE GERMANY OF TACITUS, 



In the three kingdoms they went on so as for two,* or more, 
new languages to have been evolved. In Iceland, however, the 
contrary took place. The changes were so inconsiderable as 
to leave the present Icelandic nearly in the same state in 
which it was first introduced into the island ; a fact which 
has engendered the somewhat lax statement of the Icelandic 
being the mother -tongue of the present Danish and Swedish. 
The truer statement would be that the Icelandic is the 
unaltered representative of a mother-tongue common to Iceland, 
the Faroe Isles, Norway, Siveden, and Denmark. 

The descent of the present Frisian is from the Old 
Frisian ; a language of which we have specimens as early 
as the thirteenth century. 

The descent of the present English is from the Anglo- 
Saxon ; a language of which we have specimens as old as 
the eighth century. 

The descent of the present Dutch of Holland is from the 
Old Dutch ; a language of which the oldest specimen is no 
older than the thirteenth century. 

The descent of the present Piatt- Deutsch is from the old 
dialects of the Lower Rhine ; the oldest specimens of which 
are no older than the thirteenth century. 

The descent of the present High German is from the old 
dialects of Hesse, Baden, Wurtemburg, and Bavaria ; the 
oldest specimens of which are as old as the eighth century. 

With these preliminaries, we find that out of the existing 
languages the majority can be traced upwards to a certain 
point ; the Old High German further than the Low, the 
Frisian as far as the Dutch, and the English further 
than the Frisian ; a fact which leads us to speak of the 
Old Frisian as opposed to the Middle Frisian, and the 
Middle Frisian as opposed to the New; and so on through- 
out. But as this distinction is of subordinate importance in 
ethnology, it will not be further illustrated. 

Instead of pursuing it any longer let us see what follows 



* The present Danish and Swedish, together with the numerous unwrit- 
ten dialects. 



PROLEGOMENA. V 

from taking up the question at the other end, beginning with 
a language at the earliest period of its history, inverting the 
previous process, and tracing its progress downwards from its 
first appearance in history to the present time. 

We get, by this means, more than one additional Gothic 
language. First and foremost comes — 

1. The Mceso-Gothic. — The tribes who spoke this were the 
Goths who conquered Mcesia; the date of its existence, as a 
written language, being the fourth century. The Moeso- 
Gothic has no living representative, that is, none of the 
present dialects of Germany are directly and unequivocally 
descended from it ; although the Thuringian is, probably, 
descended from some dialect originally allied to it. From 
the fact of its being the oldest Gothic dialect of which we 
have any specimen, the philological importance of the Mceso- 
Gothic is very great- 

2. The Alemannic. — This is the present literary German as 
it was written in the eighth, ninth, tenth, and eleventh cen- 
turies, and as it was spoken on the Upper Rhine, — in Baden, 
Wurtemburg, Switzerland, and Bavaria. 

3. The Frantic. — This is German of the middle Rhine, as 
it was written in the ninth and tenth centuries. 

4. The Old Dutch, Flemish, or Batavian. — This is the pre- 
sent Dutch of Holland in its oldest form. It departs from 
the Francic much as the Francic departs from the Alemannic. 
Hence the Dutch of Holland, and the Bavarian of Bavaria, 
may be considered as the two extreme forms of one and the 
same * group. All the present Piatt- Deutsch dialects of 
Germany are either exactly derived from the Francic, or 
from some form intermediate to the Francic and Batavian : 
a view which will be noticed in the sequel. 

5. The Saxon. — This falls into two divisions, the Old- 
Saxon of Westphalia, and the Anglo-Saxon of Hanover, 
afterwards transplanted to Great Britain. The Saxon lan- 
guage is extinct in Germany, being replaced by the Platt- 
Deutsch derivatives of the Francic, or Franco-Batavian. 
This circumstance supplies us with a principle of classifica- 
tion, the Platt-Deutsch dialect falling into two divisions — 

* Viz., the German Proper. — See p. ix. 



VI THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

«, the Platt-Deutsch dialect of the original Piatt- Deutsch 
area — b, the Platt-Deutsch dialects of the originally Saxon 
area. It was Charlemagne who extended the Frank Ger- 
mans at the expense of the Saxons, otherwise the present 
dialects of Westphalia and Hanover would be English, or at 
least Anglican or Angliform. 

6. The Old Frisian. — The old language of Friesland is 
known to us through the Old Frisian laws ; chiefly repre- 
senting the language of East Friesland. Of the Middle 
Frisian we have specimens in the writings of Gysbert Japicx, 
a poet of the seventeenth century. 

The older the stage of the Frisian, the more closely it 
approaches the Anglo-Saxon and the Old Saxon. 

Of the three divisions of the languages of Germany, it 
is the Hanoverian which most closely approaches the more 
northern tongues of Scandinavia. 

7. Old Norse, Old Scandinavian, or Icelandic. — This is the 
well-known language of a rich literature, consisting chiefly 
in the alliterative poems of the Skalds, and the prose narra- 
tives — fictional, historical, or domestic — of the 



§ III. ON THE CLASSIFICATION OF THE PRECEDING FORMS OF 
SPEECH. THE TERM GOTHIC. 

The great and important class which comprises these 
divisions, is called Gothic ; because it was under the 
name of Goths that some of the most important of the Ger- 
manic populations were known to the Romans. It was 
the Ostro- Goths of Alaric and Theodoric, and the Visi-Goths 
of Euric and others, who insulted the declining majesty of 
Rome, and founded the Gothic kingdoms of Italy, Spain, 
and southern Gaul ; and although other tribes of equal im- 
portance contributed to the downfall of the Western Empire, 
the term in question is, on the whole, not very inconvenient. 

The classification of the Gothic tongues is of two sorts. 

We may take the leading characteristics of certain groups, 
such as differences of grammatical structure, differences in 
the way of their vocabulary, or differences in respect to their 
system of sounds, and so make out the necessary number 



PROLEGOMENA. Vll 

of classes. We may even admit the consideration of certain 
external circumstances, such as literary development, and 
political separation. This makes the arrangement more or 
less artificial. 

Be this, however, as it may, the following is a classi- 
fication of the kind in question. 

a. The Danish, Swedish, and Norwegian dialects (written 
and unwritten), the Faroic and the Icelandic, form the 
Scandinavian branch of the Gothic stock. 

b. The Frisian, Old-Saxon, Anglo-Saxon, English, Low- 
land Scotch, Dutch of Holland, Platt-Deutsch, and High 
German, form the Teutonic branch of the same. 

Of course these again fall into subdivisions, according to 
the date of the specimen, e.g., there is the Old Frisian, 
Middle Frisian, and New Frisian ; Semi-Saxon, Old English, 
Middle English, and Modern English ; the Moeso-Gothic, 
Alemannic, &c. 

The disadvantage of this method is that, in attempting 
to draw definite lines of demarcation between the different 
divisions, it disturbs the history of the languages, and dis- 
guises the order of their evolution. Thus the Frisian, a 
member of the Teutonic branch, is undoubtedly more like 
certain Scandinavian dialects than it is to the more extreme 
members of its own division. 

Such being the case, a fresh view is required, and this is 
best given by placing the tongues in a linear series according 
to their affinities, and treating them as if (as is really the 
case) they passed into each other by insensible degrees. 

Hence, the more convenient, as well as the more natural 
series, is that of the first chapter, viz. 

1. Norse. 2. Frisian. 3. Old Saxon. 4. Anglo-Saxon. 
5, 6. Platt-Deutsch and the Dutch of Holland. 7. High 
German. 8. Mceso-Gothic. 

The general characteristics of these divisions and subdivi- 
sions of the Gothic tongues, in respect to the differences of 
their systems of elementary sounds, their grammatical struc- 
ture, and their vocabularies, are in the department of philology. 
One or two isolated pointSj however, have a practical bearing 
upon certain ethnological details. 



THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 



1 . The use of p and h for h and g respectively is High 
German rather than Low, and of the High German dialects 
more particularly Bavarian. 



COMMON HIGH GERMAN. BAVARIAN. 


ENGLISH. 


Berg... ... ... Pirk 


. Hill (berg). 


2?aiern ... ... Paiern 


Bavaria. 


Blind ... ... Plmt 


. Blind. 


Gott Zott 


. . God. 


Ge-birg-e ... ... Ke-pirk-i .. 


Range of hills, &c. 


2. The use of -t or -tt for -s or -ss 


is Low German, 


opposition to High ; as — 




PLATT-DEUTSCH. HIGH GERMAN. 


ENGLISH. 


Water Wasser ... 


. . . Water. 


SweY ... ... ... Schweiss... 


Sweat. 


Ret Es . 


... It. 



And, on the strength of the assumption which this letter- 
change allows : — 

PLATT-DEUTSCH. HIGH GERMAN. 

Gatti ... ... ... Hesse, &c. 

What applies to the Platt-Deutsch, generally, applies a 
fortiori to the Saxon, Frisian, and Norse. 

3. The Frisian chiefly differs from the Old Saxon and 
Anglo-Saxon in the forms of the plural noun and in the ter- 
mination of the infinitive mood. 

The plurals which in Anglo-Saxon and Old Saxon end in 
-s, in Frisian end in -r. 

The infinitives, which in Anglo-Saxon and Old Saxon end 
in -an, in Frisian end in -a. 



ANGLO-SAXON. 


FRISIAN. 


ENGLISH 


Cyning-os . . . 


Kening-ar . . . 


King-s. 


Beern-om 


Beern-a 


... Burn. 



4. In Norse the preference for the sound of -r to -s, and 
of -a to -an is carried further than even in Frisian. 

5. But the great characteristics of the Norse tongues, as 
opposed to the Frisian, and, a fortiori, to all the others, are, 



PROLEGOMENA. IX 

the so called passive voice, and the so-called postpositive 
article. 

a. The reflective pronoun sik = se = self coalesces with 
the verb, and so forms a reflective termination. In the later 
stages this reflective (or middle) becomes passive in power. 
Kalla = call, and sig = self. Hence come Jcalla sic/, Jcallasc, 
ballast, lallas; so that in the modern Swedish jag Mllas — 
I am called = vocor. 

b. The definite article in Norse not only follows its sub- 
stantive, but amalgamates with it; e.g., lord = table, hit — 
the or that ; bord-et — the table {board). 

If higher groups than those already suggested be required, 
we may say that — 

1. The Norse branch contains the Danish, Swedish, Nor- 
wegian, Faroic, and Icelandic. 

2. The Saxon branch, the Old Frisian, the Old Saxon, the 
Anglo-Saxon, and their respective descendants. 

3. The German Proper, the Platt-Deutsch (and Dutch of 
Holland), the High German, and the Mceso- Gothic. 

The paramount fact, however, is, the transitional character 
of the Frisian in respect to the Norse. 



§ IV. ON THE VALUE OP LANGUAGE AS A TEST OF ETHNOLOGICAL 
BELATIONSHIP. 

Such prominence has been given to the phenomena of 
language and dialect in the preceding pages, that it may not 
be superfluous to justify the exclusive attention which has 
been directed to them ; and in doing this a qualification of 
their value as tests of relationship will be added. 

It would be an undue exaggeration of the importance of 
the philological method to say, that it should supersede all 
others, and that the degrees of similarity in language exactly 
coincided with the degrees of ethnological relationship. 
They are prima facie evidence of this — strong prima facie 
evidence — but nothing more. 

Taking the world at large, there are numerous well-known 
and extreme instances of a native language having been 
unlearned, and a foreign one adopted in its stead ; e.g., the 



X THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

Blacks of St, Domingo speak French and Spanish. But, not 
to go so far, no man believes that every inhabitant of the 
British Principality who speaks English, to the exclusion of 
Welsh, is as Anglo-Saxon in blood and pedigree as he is in 
tongue. Neither does he think this in respect to his Scotch 
and Irish fellow-citizens. Indeed, every man who, being born 
of parents of different nations, speaks only one language, is 
more national in his speech than he is in his origin. 

Within the limits of Germany itself this distinction is not 
only well illustrated, but it must necessarily be borne in 
mind. 

What is the history of our own language? Throughout 
the whole length and breadth of continental Germany there 
is not only no dialect that can be called English, but — un- 
deniably as our Anglo-Saxon mother-tongue was German 
in origin — there is no dialect which can be said to have 
originated in the same source ; no descendant of the Angle 
form of speech. 

The same applies to the allied dialect of the Old Saxons. 
Where that was once spoken, Platt-Deutsch and High 
German are now the exclusive idioms ; no descendants from 
anything Saxon, but descendants from members of the 
Proper German groups. 

Extinct as are these two dialects, it is by no means 
reasonable to imagine a similar extinction of Anglo-Saxon 
and Old Saxon blood. Difficult as the traces of it are to 
detect, they may fairly be supposed to exist. 

What applies to the Anglo-Saxon and the Old-Saxon 
applies to the Moeso- Gothic also. 

Though no existing dialect can be traced to it, it cannot 
be doubted but that the blood of the ancestors of the Ostro- 
Goths and Visi-Goths must run in the veins of some southern 
Germans — few or many as the case may be. 

Hence the evidence of language is prima facie evidence 
only. 

Such is the measure of its absolute value — a measure which 
subtracts from its importance. 

But what if language be the only test we have ; or, if not 
the only one, the one whose value transcends that of all the 



PROLEGOMENA. xi 

rest put together. In such a case, it regains its importance ; 
its relative value being thus heightened. 

And such is the fact. No differences of physical appear- ^ 
ance, intellectual habits, or moral characteristics will give us 
the same elements of classification that we find in the study 
of the Germanic languages and dialects. They may, perhaps, 
have done so once, when there was a variety of Pagan creeds 
and several self-evolved and, consequently, characteristic 
laws. But they do not do so now. A value they have, but 
that value is a subordinate one. 



§ V. PRESENT DISTRIBUTION AND CLASSIFICATION OF FAMILIES 
AND NATIONS DESCENDED FROM, OR ALLIED TO, THE SARMAT^E 
OF TACITUS. 

The three great recognized families from which Tacitus 
separates the Germans, and with which he contrasts them, are 
— 1. The Gauls or Kelts — 2. The Finns — 3. The Sarmatians : 
this last term being used, by the present writer, in a more defi- 
nite sense than the one which it bore with the ancients. Here 
it comprises the Slavonians of Bohemia, Silesia, Poland, Gal- 
licia, Russia, Servia, Croatia, Carniola, Hungary, Prussia, and 
Bulgaria, and something more. It comprises the Lithua- 
nians, Courlanders, Livonians, and Old Prussians as well. 

The Sarmatians, Finns, and Gauls are the three great 
recognized families from which Tacitus separates, and with 
which he contrasts, the Germans. But are they not the only 
ones ? He notices the Dacians, the Pannonians, and the 
Bhatians as well. It is only, however, the Sarmatians that 
at present require a special preliminary investigation. 

The two primary divisions into which the great Sarmatian 
stock falls are — 1. The Slavonic — 2. The Lithuanic. 

The details of the Lithuanic branch will be found in the 
sequel. 

The details of the Slavonic branch are numerous, compli- 
cated, and important. 

First and foremost comes the notice of their present geo- 
graphical distribution. 

Geographically, they fall into two large divisions, 



Xll THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

from each othet one of which lies wholly to the north, the 

other, wholly to the south of the Danube. 

North of the Danube, reckoning from west to east, come — 

A. 1. The Tshekhs, or Bohemians of Bohemia. 

2. The Moravians, or the Tshekhs of Moravia, nearly 
identical with the Bohemians — the two languages being but 
sub-dialects of the common Tshekh tongue. ■ 

3. The Slovaks of Upper Hungary, differing more from the 
Bohemians and Moravians than those two nations do from 
each other, but still belonging to the great Tshekh or Bo- 
hemian division. The dialects and sub-dialects of the Slovak 
language are as numerous as the Slovak villages ; a fact from 
which some inferences will be drawn in the sequel. 

The Tshekh division is limited to Bohemia, Moravia, and 
Upper Hungary. Both northwards and eastwards, the 
character of the language changes. 

B. Silesia, even at the present moment, is not wholly Ger- 
man. The Serkie of Lower and the Srbie of Upper Lusatia 
are Slavonic. They do not, however, belong to the Tshekh 
so much as to the Lekh, or Polish branch. Hence their 
affinities are with their north-eastern rather than with their 
south-western neighbours. 

1, 2. The Serke and Serbs are the most south-western 
members now in existence of the Lekh branch of the Slavonic 
stock ; a division which takes the form of a separate substan- 
tive nationality with — 

3. The Poles of Poland, Posen, parts of Gallicia, parts of 
Lithuania, and parts of Pomerania. 

0. Russian. A modified form of the Russian, called Rus- 
niak, or Ruthenian — occurs as far west as Gallicia, where 
it is in contact with the Slovak of Upper Hungary and the 
Polish of Poland. Further to the north it is bounded by the 
Lithuanian of Lithuania, Courland, and Livonia, and by the 
Esthonian of Esthonia — this last being a Finnic language. 
Vast as is the area covered by the Russian language, its 
dialects are remarkably few ; a fact which should be con- 
trasted with the multiplicity of dialects in the Slovak. 

And here the north- Slavonic area ends; an area which 
we may, if we choose, call TVcms-Danubian, since all the 



PROLEGOMENA. Xlll 

countries which it comprises lie on the north side of that 
river. 

South of the Danube, reckoning from west to east, come — 

1 . The Slavonians of Oarinthia, Carniola, Styria, and 
south-western Hungary. Differing hut slightly from — 

2. The Oroatians — themselves the speakers of a language 
which extends, with hut few variations of dialect, from the 
Adriatic to the Euxine — the language of the Montenegrino 
mountaineers on the frontier of Albania, the Dalmatians, the 
Herzegovinians, the Bosniacs, the Servians, the southern 
Hungarians, the Slavonians of Slavonia at the junction of the 
Save and Danube, and the Bulgarians. 

The Slavonic languages, like the Germanic, must be studied 
in respect to their history as well as their geographical 
distribution — in respect to time as well as place. In this 
respect, the fact which has the most important application is 
connected with the southern division of them. It was in a 
Servian, Croatian, or Dalmatian, dialect that Christianity was 
first preached, and the first scriptural translations made. 
Hence, the so-called old Slavonic has the same importance in 
Russian and Servian philology as the Moeso-Gothic has in 
German. 

The northern frontier of the south-Slavonic area is formed 
by a line running through Styria, Southern Hungary, and the 
northern part of Bulgaria ; the southern frontier of the 
northern by Bohemia, Moravia, Gallicia, Volhynia, and Podo- 
lia ; the intermediate non-Slavonic countries being Hungary, 
Wallachia, and Moldavia. 

The Hungarians, or Majiars, are of Finnic origin, and 
constitute an intrusive population, the date of their intrusion 
being the tenth century. 

The Wallachians, Moldavians, and Bessarabians are par- 
tially at least of Latin origin, and, so far as they are so, 
they constitute, like the Majiars, an intrusive population, 
the date of their intrusion being the second century, i.e., the 
time of Trajan the conqueror of Dacia. 

We have seen that, in respect to their geographical dis- 
tribution, the Russians, Poles, and Bohemians, belong to 
one division, the Servians and Slavonians to another. Is 



XIV THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

this the case in ethnology I No. The Russian language, 
although northern in locality, is southern in structure, being 
more akin to the Servian, with which it is not in contact, 
than the Polish with which it is. Nay, more, the older 
the specimens of the language the more it approaches the 
Old Church-language, or the Old Slavonic. 



J VI. ON THE DATE OF THE DIFFUSION OF THE RUSSIAN LAN- 
GUAGE OVER RUSSIA. 

This is by no means an irrelevant question even in German 
ethnology. For that of southern Europe and Asia it is all- 
important. 

The greater the area we give to the Germans of Tacitus, 
the less room we leave for the numerous Sarmatian popula- 
tions now in existence ; and the less room we leave for these, 
the greater the difficulty of accounting for their wide diffusion. 

By supposing, however, that they originated in so large 
a country as Russia we meet this difficulty, since we thereby 
allow ourselves a vast tract of land to draw upon for the 
several migrations necessary to account for the present 
presence of Poles in Poland, Serbs in Silesia, Tsheks in 
Bohemia, Slovaks in Hungary, and Carinthians, Croatians, 
and Dalmatians, elsewhere. 

But what if the internal evidence derived from the paucity 
of Russian dialects, or (changing the expression) the uni- 
formity of that tongue over a vast area indicate — as such 
phenomena do indicate — a recent introduction and a rapid 
diffusion ? In this case, the difficulty remains as before, 
and we must not only exclude a great number of Slavonians 
from the countries of the west, but from the valley of the 
Dnieper also. 

Now, from all that I collect from the language of the 
best Slavonic scholars, the Russian tongue in Russia seems 
full as new as the Anglo-Saxon is in England; in other words, 
its dialects are fewer and less marked than those of the 
English of Great Britain. 

On the other hand, it is in the south and west that such 
differences are the most marked and the most numerous. 



PROLEGOMENA. XV 

As far, then, as this goes we are unable to draw upon 
Russia as the source of the Sarmatian populations of the 
countries in question ; a fact which should open our eyes 
to the difficulties amongst which we place ourselves by too 
implicitly believing that the ancient Germans originally ex- 
tended indefinitely far eastwards. 

Neither can we go too far north for the parent country of 
the Slavonians — since, as late as the tenth century, we have 
historical evidence in favour of the Finnic stock having 
extended as far south as the Valdai mountains, between 
Petersburg- and Moscow. 



§ VII. DISTRIBUTION OF THE FAMILIES AND NATIONS DESCENDED 
FROM, OR ALLIED TO, THE SARMATJ3 OF TACITUS IN THE NINTH 
CENTURY. 

To understand the import of this chapter, it is necessary, 
in the first place, to bear in mind the distinction between 
first-hand and second-hand evidence ; and, in the second, to 
appreciate the full import of the palaontological character of 
ethnological reasoning — the paleeontological method meaning 
the method of reasoning from effect to cause, rather than from 
cause to effect. The geologist understands this at once. 
The historian requires it to be pointed out. 

Now, such information as we collect from Tacitus concern- 
ing the Cherusci, Chauci, Frisii, and the other nations of 
the Lower Rhine and Weser, is of very different value from 
his statement concerning the Semnones, Lemovii, and the 
nations beyond the Elbe. The former was collected, either 
directly or indirectly, from men who visited the localities 
described, fought in them, marched in them, sailed up their 
rivers, and acted as pioneers across their fens. The latter 
are based upon such information as the people of the parts 
which were known could supply concerning the unknown 
parts beyond them. As time advanced, however, the more 
remote countries beyond the Elbe, beyond the Weser, and 
beyond the Vistula, became known even as the terri- 
tories of the Catti and Cherusci were known ; so that in- 
formation concerning Pomerania, or Prussia, became as definite 



XVI THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

and trustworthy as the earlier information about Hesse and 
Westphalia. 

The period when the parts beyond the Elbe, dimly sketched 
by Tacitus, first become known in definite detail, and from 
personal knowledge, is the reign of Charlemagne — some, 
indeed, earlier, some later ; but still the reign of Charlemagne 
is a convenient era, and an era sufficiently accurate for all 
present purposes. 

Advancing from the dim twilight of a fragmentary and 
second-hand history to the full light derived from the personal 
knowledge of contemporary witnesses, the first question which 
we ask is the extent to which our new knowledge confirms or 
invalidates our previous accounts. It may do either one or 
the other. If it confirm them, well and good. If it oppose, 
a conflict of difficulties arises. In either case, the existing 
state of things at the time when our information first becomes 
unexceptionable is the primary and fundamental fact with 
the ethnologist ; indeed, it is his primum mobile ; an instru- 
ment of criticism which the historian, who is more accus- 
tomed to rely upon testimony than to venture upon ela- 
borate trains of reasoning, is not unwilling to accuse him 
of over- valuing ; the ethnologist, on the other hand, imputing 
to the historian an undue deference to fallible and indistinct 
testimony. 

Such are the preliminary observations which prepare the 
reader for the statement that nearly the whole of that portion 
of the Germania of Tacitus which lies east of the Elbe, as well 
as certain portions of it west of that river, are, at the be- 
ginning of the proper historical period, not Germanic but 
Slavonic. 

That they are more or less Slavonic in the present century, 
has been shown already ; but that they were so as early as 
the ninth, eighth, and seventh centuries, is a fact not 
sufficiently appreciated. 

The following is a sketch of the details :— 

Livonia, Courland, East and West Prussia. — Here the 
definite history begins with the twelfth century, when the 
Pagan Lithuanians were converted by the Knights of the 
Teutonic Order. At that time the whole of the area was 



PROLEGOMENA. XV11 

unequivocally Sarmatian, without trace or vestige of any pre- 
vious Germanic population — no German names for the rivers 
or mountains, and no Germanic strongholds in any of the 
impervious forests and impracticable fens, — no traditions on 
the part of the Sarmatians of their own comparatively recent 
arrival in the country. That any portion of the present Ger- 
manic population of the countries in question is descended from 
an ancestry earlier than a.d. 800, is what no one has ever 
ventured to assert, so evidently is it of recent origin, and so 
totally has any older population — if such ever existed — died 
off without leaving trace, or shadow of a trace, of its 
existence. 

Pomerania, East of the Oder. — Adam of Bremen first 
mentions these Pomeranians, and he mentions them as Slavo- 
nians, the Oder being their boundary to the west. On the 
east they were conterminous with the Prussians. Their name 
is Slavonic, po — on and more — sea, = coastmen. All their 
antiquities and traditions are equally so ; in other words there 
is neither evidence, nor shadow of evidence, of their ever 
having dispossessed an older Germanic population. Nor are 
they wholly extinct at the present moment. On the promon- 
tories which project into the Gulf of Dantzig we find the 
Slavonic Kassub, Cassubitce, or Kaszeb. Their language 
approaches the Polish. 

Pomerania, west of the Oder, and the eastern part of Meck- 
lenburg. — No definite notices of these parts occur before the 
time of Charlemagne. From that time downwards, however, 
they are numerous. The only Germans that they recognize are 
the conquering invaders. On the other hand, the Slavonic 
populations are carefully enumerated, and so thoroughly do 
they fill up the whole area that there is neither nook nor 
cranny for any thing German. The chief nation is that of 
the Wilzi, Welatabi, or Liutici, falling into the minor divi- 
sions of the Chizzini, near the present town of Rostock, the 
Circipani, on the coast opposite the Isle of Rugen, the To- 
lenzi, on the Tollensee, and the Bethrarii of the civitas Rethre. 
Now, whatever the others may have been, these last were no 
new-comers, since the town was preeminent for its antiquity, 
and the temple which it contained celebrated for its sanctity. 



XVlli THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

The Island of Bug en. — Like the town of Rethre, the Isle 
of Rugen was at one and the same time Slavonic, and 
sacred ; its sacro-sanctitude implying the antiquity of the 
rites practised in it. 

Coast of Mecklenburg. — Nothing is known of Mecklenburg 
older than the pre-eminently Slavonic Obodrites, separated by 
the river Warnow from the Wilzi, and by the Trave from 
the Slavonians of — 

Holstein. — Here, for the first time, do we meet with a true 
Slavono-Germanic frontier. A line drawn from the Trave to 
the head-waters of the Eyder forms it. North of the Eyder, 
in the time of Alfred, were the Danes ; west of the Trave, 
the Saxons ; between those rivers and the sea, the Slavonic 
Wagri. The city of Altenburg was Wagrian, and so was 
the Isle of Femern. 

Lauenburg. — This was the locality of the Polabi, or Slavo- 
nians of the Elbe from po = on and Laba = Elbe. 

Uckermark. — Here dwelt, at the end of the tenth century, 
the Slavonic Ucri or Wucri. 

Interior of Mecklenburg and Mittelmark. — The country 
between the Hevel and the Muritz-See, a vast wood, requiring 
five days to traverse it, was the land of the Slavonic Murizzi 
or Morizani ; westwards of these, and extending as far as the 
Elbe, were the Wamabi — Slavonic also. 

Brandenburg . — Brandenburg is more than sufficiently 
covered by Slavonic tribes ; since, the Hevelli or Slavonians 
of the Hevel, the Stoderani, the Brizani, the Linones, the 
Smeldingi, the Dossani, and the Bethenici, although the exact 
localities have yet to be investigated, are quite enough to fill 
the tract between Slavonic Altmark on the north-west, 
and — 

Lusatia on the south-east ; Lusatia, which is, at the pre- 
sent moment, Semi- Slavonic, and which was originally wholly 
so, Lower Lusatia being the country of the Milcieni, Upper 
Lusatia of the Lusici. 

Silesia. — Now, and from the dawn of the historical period, 
Silesia has been in the same category with Lusatia — i.e., essen- 
tially Slavonic. 

The Slavonians of Lusatia and Silesia formerly extended 



PROLEGOMENA. xix 

as far into the present country of Germany as the river 
Werra, and as the head-waters of the Maine. 

Bohemia with parts of Moravia and Upper Hungary. — 
These countries have never been known to be more German 
than at present, and at present they are Slavonic. At the 
same time, I believe that there are traditions among the pre- 
sent Tshekhs, which refer to their conquest of the country and 
the usurpation of their ancestors. The value of these depends 
upon their nationality. This may be absolute. It may, on 
the other hand, be of the same value as the traditions about 
Brut being the patriarch of the Britons, or, in other words, 
the legend may be more due to the influence of a medieval 
Latin literature, than the truly native traditions. 

Having thus enumerated the countries which were as much 
(or more) Slavonic a thousand years ago as they are now, I 
subjoin some of the chief extracts that prove their having been 
so — all of them being taken from Zeuss, and those only being 
selected which the date accompanies, and where there is, 
besides this, the special statement that the population in ques- 
tion was Slavonic. 

The latest notices come first. They are chiefly from Adam 
of Bremen and Helmoldus, and apply to the Slavonians of 
the northern frontier. 

The twelfth and eleventh centuries. — For the parts on the 
Lower Elbe and Oder. — The most important of the notices 
here apply to the Isle of Rugen, and bear, amongst other 
questions, upon the note in v. Rugii : — " Insula contra Wilzos 
posita, quani Hani vel Runi possident, fortissima Slavorum 
gens, extra quorum sententiam de publicis rebus nihil agi lex 
est, ita illi metuuntur propter familiaritatem deorum, vel potius 
dsenionum, quos majori cultu ceteris venerantur.'" — Ad. Brem. 
de situ Dan. c. 226. " Supervenit exercitus Rugianorum sive 
Ranorum. . . Sunt autem Rani, qui ab aliis Runi appellantur, 
populi crudeles, habitantes in corde maris, idololatrise supra 
modum dediti, primatum prefer entes in omni Slavorum na- 
tione, habentes regem et fanum celeberrimum. LTnde etiam 
propter specialem fani illius cultum primum venerationis locum 
obtinent, et cum multis jugum imponant, ipsi nullius jugum 
patiuntur, eo quod inaccessibiles sint propter difficultatem 



XX THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

locorum.'" — Helm. iv. 36. " De omnibus quoque provinciis 
Slavorum illic responsa petuntur et saerificiorum exhibentur 
annuse solutiones. — c. 6. " Etiam nostra adhuc setate non 
solum Wagirensis terra, sed et omnes Slavorum provincise illuc 
tributa annuatim transmittebant, ilium (Zuantevit) Deum 
Deorum esse profitentes." — Id. ii. 42. 

For the Slaves of the continent the following extracts give 
us the occupants of the Lower Oder, — " Oddora vergens in 
boreain per medios Winulorum transit populos."' 1 — Adam Bre- 
mens. Hist. Eccl. c. 66. " Ultra Leuticos, qui alio nomine 
Wilzi dicuntur, Oddora flumen occurrit. ,, — Ibid. "Cum multi 
sunt Winulorum populi fortitudine celebres, soli quatuor 
sunt, qui ab illis Wilzi, a nobis vero Leuticii dicuntur, inter 
quos de nobilitate potentiaque contenditur. Hi sunt scilicet 
Chizzini et Circipani, qui habitant citra Panim fluvium, 
Thosolantes et Rheteri, qui ultra Panim degunt." — Ibid. c. 140. 

In the following extract from Helmoldus, mark the su- 
perlative antiquissimam, — "De fortitudine et potentia valida 
orta est contentio. Siquidem Riaduri sive Tholenzi propter 
antiquissimam, urbem et celeberrimum illud fanum, in quo 
simulacrum Radigast ostenditur, regnare volebant, adscri- 
bentes sibi singularem nobilitatis honorem, eo quod ab omnibus 
populis Slavorum frequentarentur, propter responsa et annuas 
saerificiorum impensiones. Porro Circipani atque Kycini 
servire detrectabant, imo libertatem suam armis defendere 
statuei'mit." — Helm. iv. 21 . 

More satisfactory, however, than the accumulation of 
isolated passages is the following general view, — "Populi igitur 
Slavorum sunt multi, quorum primi ab occidente confines 
Transalbianis sunt Waigri (al. Vagri), eorum civitas Alden- 
burg maritima. Deinde sequuntur Obodriti, qui altero nomine 
Reregi vocantur, et civitas eorum Magnopolis. Item versus 
nos Polabingi, quorum civitas Racisburg. Ultra quos Lin- 
gones [Linones] sunt et Warnahi. Mox habitant Chizzini et 
Circipani, quos a Tholosantibus et Retharis fluvius Panis 
separat, et civitas Dimine. Ibi est terminus Hammaburgensis 
parochise. Sunt et alii Slavorum populi, qui inter Albiam 
et Odderam degunt, sicut Ifeveldi, qui juxta Haliolam [Ha- 
bolam] fluvium, et Doxani, Liubuzzi, Wilini et Stoderani 



PROLEGOMENA. XXI 

cum multis aliis. Inter quos medii et potentissimi omnium 
sunt Hetharii, civitas eorum vulgatissima Rethre, secies 
idololatriee. 11 — Ad. Brem. c. 64. 

The ninth century. — Earlier than Adam of Bremen, the 
notices are fragmentary. HoAvever, "a.d. 808. Filius impera- 
toris Karlus Albiam ponte junxit, et exercitum cui prseerat 
in Linones et Smeldingos . . . transposuit. 11 — Annal. Egenh. 
ad annum. — Pertz i. 195. To which add, as proof of the 
Linones being Slavonic, — " Sclavi illi dicti sunt Lini sive 
Linoges?'' — Helmold. i. 37. With the Linones, the Smel- 
dingi and Bethenici are generally associated, and never once 
considered as other than Slavonic ; though, at the same 
time, Smeld-ww? is a German form. 

The eighth century. For the parts on the Upper Elbe and 
Saale. — "a.d. 782. Sorabi Sclavi, qui campos inter Albim 
et Salam interjacentes incolunt in fines Thuringorum et 
Saxonum qui erant eis contermini, preedandi causa ingressi." 
— Annal. Einh. ad an. Pertz i. 168. 

In the seventh century. — "a.d. 623. Anno xl. regni Chlotharii 
homo quidam, nomine Samo, natione Francus de pago Sen- 
nonago, plures secum negotiantes adscivit, ad exercendum 
negotium in Sclavos cognomento Winidas pen-exit. 11 — Fre- 
degar, c. 48. 

The continuation of Samo's history shows that the Vinidce 
here named were the Wends of Bohemia, at least, if not of 
Bohemia, of the parts still more west, — " Multis posthaec 
vicibus Winidi in Thoringiam et reliquos vastando pagos in 
Francorum regnum irruunt. Etiam et Dervanus dux gentis 
Urbiorum (Surbiorum) qui ex genere Slavonorum erant, 
et ad regnum Francorum jam olim adspexerant, se ad regnum 
Samoni cum suis tradidit. 11 — Fredegar, c. 68. 

The evidence that there were Slavonians on the Saale in 
the reign of Dagobert is abundant. — 

" Anno x. regni Dagoberti cum ei nuntiatum fuisset exerci- 
tum Winidorum Thoringiam fuisse ingressum. 11 — c. 74. 

" Anno xi. regni Dagoberti cum Winidi jussu Samonis for- 
titer samrent, et ssepe transcenso eorum limite regnum 
Francorum vastandum Thoringiam et reliquos pagos ingre- 
direntur. 11 — 75. 



XXii THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

Three other extracts bearing on the early distribution of the 
Slavonic nations are of sufficient importance to have particu- 
lar prominence given to them. 

1. The Munich library contains a MS. of the eleventh 
century, written in the monastery of St. Emmeram, in 
Bavaria, from which the following is an extract. It may 
conveniently be called either the St. Emmeram MS., or the 
Descriptio Civitatum. 

" Descriptio civitatum et regionum ad septentrionalem plagam 
Danubii. Isti sunt qui propinquiores resident finibus Dana- 
orum quos vocant Nortabtrezi, ubi regio in qua sunt civitates 
Liu., per duces suos partitse. Uuilci, in qua civitates xcv., et 
regiones mi. Linaa, est populus qui habet civitates vn. 
Prope illis resident quos vocant Bethenici, et Smeldingon, et 
Morizani, qui habent civitates xr. Juxta illos sunt qui vocantur 
Hehfeldi, qui habent civitates viii. Juxta illos regio quse 
vocatur Surbi, in qua regione plures sunt quse habent civitates 
l. Juxta illos sunt quos vocant Talaminzi, qui habent civi- 
tates xiiii. Beheimare, in qua sunt civitates xv. Marharii, 
habent civitates xi. Uulgarii, regio est immensa et populus 
niultus habens civitates v., eo quod multitudo magna ex eis 
sit [vaga?] et non sit eis opus civitates habere. Est populus 
quern vocant Merehanos, ipsi habent civitates xxx. Istee sunt 
regiones quss terminant in finibus nostris. 

" Isti sunt qui juxta istorum fines resident. Osterab- 
trezi, in qua civitates plusquam c. sunt. Miloxi, in qua 
civitates lxvii. Phesnuzi, habent civitates lxx. Thadesi, 
plusquam cc. urbes habent. Glopeani, in qua civitates cccc. 
aut eo amplius. Zuireani, habent civitates cccxxv. Busani, 
habent civitates ccxxxi. Sittici, regio immensa populis et 
urbibus munitissimis. Stadici, in qua civitates dxvi., popu- 
lusque infinitus. Sebbirozi, habent civitates xc. Unlizi, 
populus multus, civitates cccxviii. Neriuani, habent civitates 
lxxviii. Attorozi, habent cxlviii., populus ferocissimus. 
Eptaradici, habent civitates cclxiii. Uuillerozi, habent civi- 
tates clxxx. Zabrozi, habent civitates ccxii. Znetalici, 
habent civitates lxxiiii. Aturezani, habent civitates cini. 
Chozirozi, habent civitates ccl. Lendizi, habent civitates 
xcvni. Thafnezi, habent civitates cclvii. Zeriuani, quod 



PROLEGOMENA. XXlll 

tantum est regnum ut ex eo cunctse gentes Sclauorum exorta? 
sint et originem sicut affirmant ducant. Prissani, civitates 
lxx. Uelunzani, civitates lxx. Bruzi, plus est undique, 
quam de Enisa ad Rhenum. Uuizunbeire, Oaziri, civitates c. 

" Ruzzi. Forsderen liudi. Fresiti. Serauici. Lucolane. 
Ungare. Uuislane. Sleenzane, civitates xv. Lunsizi, civitates 
xxx. Dadosesani, civitates xx. Milzane, civitates xxx. 
Besunzane, civitates n. Uerizane, civitates x. Fraganeo, 
civitates xl. Lupiglaa, civitates xxx. Opolini, civitates xx. 
Golensizi, civitates v.*" 

2. Nearly contemporary with this is the account of the 
oldest Russian chronicler, and the father of Slavonic history, — 
Nestor, a monk of Kiov, in the beginning of the twelfth 
century. The names are given in the Slavonic forms for the 
sake of showing the frequency of the termination -ne ; and 
the reader's attention is also directed to the extent to which 
the Scriptural view of the general dispersion of mankind is 
connected with the particular history of the Slavonians — " Of 
these seventy-two populations, the Slovenian was one ; also 
from the families of Japhet, named Illyrian (Ilurici), which 
are Slovenian (Slow-jene). 

" And after many years the Slovenians settled on the 
Danube, where now the Ungarian (Ugorskaja) and Bulgarian 
lands (Ugor'skaja — Bolgarskaja Zemlja) are. From these 
Slovenians the race spread itself over the earth, and they gave 
their names in the places where they settled. So their pos- 
terity, which settled on the river Morawa, named themselves 
Moravians (Morava), and others Tshekhs (Czesi) ; and such 
are these Slovenians, the white Oroatians (Chorwati Vjelii), 
the Serbs (Serb') as the Carinthians (Charunt-ane). 

" When the Vallachians (Voloch) made an inroad on the 
Slovenians of the Danube, and conquered them, and con- 
strained them, the Slovenians went forth, and settled on the 
Vistula (Vislje), and called themselves Lekhs (Ljachove). 
And some of these people were named Poles (Pol-jane), and 
others Lekhs, others Lusatians (Luticzi) others Masovians 
(Mazovszane), others Pomoranians (Po-mor-jane). 

" Thus came those Slovenians who settled on the Dnieper, 
and were called Poles. Others were called Derevlians (Dere- 



XXIV THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

wljane), because they settled in the woods. Others settled 
between the Dwina, and Prepecz, and called themselves 
Dregovitshians (Dregoviczi). Others, too, fixed themselves 
on the Dwina, and became called Polotsliians (Polocz-ane), 
from the name of a river which flows into the Dwina. 

" Other Slovenians, descendants of those on the Danube, 
settled on Lake Ilmin (jezero Ilmena), and kept their name, 
and built a city, and named it Novogorod. And others 
settled on the Desna, and on the Sem, and on the Suna, and 
called themselves Severians (Sjevera). 

" And so the Slovenian tongue spread itself abroad, from 
which came the Slovenian writing." — This is from Zeuss, 
translation, pp. 597 — 599. 

3. Earlier than either of these, though less full, is the fol- 
lowing passage from Alfred's Orosius.* 

" Be norSan Eald-Seaxum is Apdrede, and east norS is 
Vylte, the man Aefeldan hset, and be eastan him is Vineda 
land, the man hset Syssyle,-\ and east sivS ofer summe dsel 
Maroaro, and hi Maroaro habbaS be vestan him Thyringas, 
and Behemas, and BsegSvare healfe, and be suSan him on 
oSre healfe Donua thsere ea is thset land Oarendre. Su8 oS 
tha beorgas, the man Alpis hset, to thsem ilcan beorgan 
licgaS BagSvara land gemsere, and Sveefa, and thonne be 
eastan Carendran lande, begeondan thsern vestenne, is Pulgara 
land, and be eastan thaem is Creca land, and be eastan Maroaro 
lande is Visle land, and be eastan theem sind Datia, tha the 
in vaeron Gottan. Be norSan eastan Maroara sindon Dala- 
mensan, and be eastan Dalamensam sindon Horithi, and 
be norSan Dalamensam sindon Surpe, and be vestan him 
sindon Sysele. Be norSan Horiti is MsegSaland, and be 
norSan MsegSaland is Sermende oS tha beorgas Riffin. 1 ' 

* For the translation of this, see Appendix I. 

t The italics mean that the word will be noticed in the Epilegomena. 



PROLEGOMENA. XXV 



§ VIII. ON THE ASSUMPTIONS NECESSARY TO RECONCILE THE USUAL 
INTERPRETATIONS OF TACITUS WITH THE STATE OF THINGS IN 
THE SEVENTH, EIGHTH, NINTH, TENTH, AND ELEVENTH CEN- 
TURIES. 

It cannot be denied that the contrast between the evidence 
of Tacitus, who wrote from what he heard in the second, 
and the evidence of the authors of the time of Charlemagne, 
who wrote from what they knew, in the ninth, is remark- 
able. What are we to say \ 

1. That the evidence of Tacitus must be impugned. 

2. That the evidence of Tacitus must be limited. 

3. Or, that a vast system of migrations and displacements 
must be assumed, in order to reconcile the first accurately 
known state of things with the testimony of a writer whom 
we are unwilling to take exceptions to ? 

Whichever of these views be adopted, our decision ought 
to be made after a very careful and mature deliberation. 
There are complications on both sides, and the whole ques- 
tion is a balance of conflicting difficulties. 

The occupation of the tract of country between the Vistula 
and the Elbe in the tenth century by Slavonians is prima 
facie evidence of a similar occupancy in the second. 

The term Germania, applied to the same by Tacitus, is 
prima facie evidence the other way. To decide in favour of 
a Slavonic population on the strength of the former fact, 
irrespective of the conflicting testimony of Tacitus, is illegi- 
timate ; but it is equally so to take that testimony without 
doubt, qualification, or scrutiny. To place evidence opposed 
to the a priori probabilities upon the same level with evi- 
dence supported by them is unscientific in the extreme ; 
indeed the writer who does it places all evidence on the 
same level, and requires the same amount of testimony for 
probabilities and improbabilities, for the barely possible and 
for the morally certain. 

Of all the populations east of the Elbe which Tacitus, in 
the second century, called German, no single vestige appears 
in the tenth. How is this? Was the original statement 



XXVI THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

erroneous, or has subsequent change taken place ? No general 
answer can be given to the question. It depends upon the 
credibility of the author on the one side, and the likelihood 
of the changes assumed, on the other. If the changes are pro- 
bable and the author unexceptionable, the decision is in favour 
of the change. If the author, however, be exceptionable and 
the changes such as have never been previously known, the 
converse is the case. Between these extremes there is every 
intermediate degree. The changes may be of average magni- 
tude, and the author of medium credibility. All this, how- 
ever, merely shows that the balance between the conflicting* 
difficulties is easily struck in some cases, that in some it is 
difficult, and in others almost impossible. 

I am not, just at present, prepared to decide upon the 
particular case in hand, or to determine whether Tacitus has 
been, at one and the same time, accurate in all his state- 
ments, and rightly interpreted by his commentators, or 
whether he has not confounded Slavonians and Lithuanians 
with Germans. This will come in due time ; at present it 
is sufficient to take an exception against the uncritical spirit 
in which his evidence has been treated. Two distinctions of 
paramount importance have been neglected. 

1. The extent to which his statements are at variance with 
the first known state of things subsequent to his time, has 
been overlooked. 

2. The value of his evidence for the parts which could 
only be known, to even his best informants, by hearsay only, 
has been placed on the same level with the value of his 
evidence respecting the parts personally known to his con- 
temporaries. 

How different, for instance, were his means of describing a 
Frisian or a Oheruscan, from his data for Poland and Silesia. 
Yet Poland and Silesia are parts of the Germania of Tacitus, 
and Friesland and Osnaburg are no more. The legionary of 
Drusus or Tiberius might describe, from personal knowledge, 
the populations of Ems, or Weser; but, whoever described the 
tribes of the Oder or Vistula, would describe them from hear- 
say accounts, — hearsay accounts, which I have no wish to 
undervalue, — hearsay accounts which can often be satisfac- 



PROLEGOMENA. XXVll 

torily confirmed, — hearsay accounts, however, which have 
just the same relation to the descriptions of the parts visited 
by the Soman armies, as the data for the geography of 
Central Africa have to the surveys of the colonies of Natal, 
the Cape, or Angola. 

This leads us to a new series of preliminary points of 
criticism. 

A certain amount of migration and displacement is neces- 
sary. If Germans were the original occupants of the parts 
in question, the Slavonians must have superseded them 
in it. 

The likelihood or unlikelihood of this must be tested in 
several ways. 

First, in respect to its extent. — The assumed migration must 
have been unsurpassed, perhaps unequally, by any other within 
the historical period. When the Germans of Charlemagne, 
and his successors, conquered (or re-conquered) Transalbian 
Germany, there was neither trace nor record of any previous 
Germanic occupancy. Yet such previous occupancy rarely 
occurs without leaving signs of its existence. Sometimes 
there are fragments of the primitive population safe in the 
protecting fastnesses of some mountain, forest, or fen, whose 
savage independence testifies their original claim on the soil. 
In this way the Welsh of Wales, and the Basques of the 
Pyrenees, are monuments of that aboriginal population which 
held possession of Spain and Britain, long before the begin- 
ning of history, and which partially holds possession of them 
now. Yet there is no want of natural strongholds in the 
country in question. The Saxon Switzerland, the Bohemian 
range, the forests of Lithuania might well have been to the 
Germans of Tacitus, what Snowdon was to the Britons of 
Agricola, or the Pyrenees to the old Iberians ; in which case 
the present Germans of those countries would be the oldest 
inhabitants of them, — not the newest, as they are. 

Another way in which a primitive, but displaced population 
escapes annihilation, is, by taking upon itself the character of 
a servile population. In this way the Helots of Sparta, 
represent the older inhabitants of Laconia, as well as the 
conquered Messenians. Upon this principle Niebuhr argues 



XXviii THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

that the circumstance of certain Greek towns of Southern 
Italy, calling their slaves Pelasgi, indicates a previous Pelasgic 
population. By a not illegitimate extension of this view, 
the existence of the system of castes is supposed to betoken a 
duality of race, — the conquered and the conquerors. But a 
servile class of conquered aborigines, was as much wanting in 
the Slavonian portions of the Germania, when it was first 
known otherwise than by hearsay, as the analogues of the 
Welsh or Biscayans. The signs of a primitive population, 
shown as they show themselves in Britain or Spain ; shown 
as they showed themselves in Greece or Italy ; or shown as 
they showed themselves in Hindostan, were equally non- 
existent. 

Neither were there any traditions. No lays celebrated 
either the Arthur which defended, or the Ida which ravaged 
the soil. The supposed conquerors knew of no indigent, 
which they replaced. No indigence complained of the 
stranger who dispossessed them. 

Lastly, Saxon as is England, the oldest geographical terms 
are Keltic ; some of the original names of the rivers and 
mountains remaining unchanged. The converse is the case 
in Transalbingian Germany. The older the name the more 
surely is it Slavonic. 

So much for the extent of the assumed displacement. It 
must have been the greatest and the most absolute of any 
recorded in history. 

It must also have taken place with unparalleled rapidity. 
By supposing that the assumed changes set in immediately 
after the time of Tacitus, and that as soon as that writer had 
recorded the fact that Poland, Bohemia, and Gourland were 
parts of Germania, the transformation of these previously 
Teutonic areas into Slavonic ones, began, we have a con- 
dition as favourable for a great amount of changes as can 
fairly be demanded. Still it may be improved. The last 
traces of the older population may be supposed to have died 
out only just before the time when the different areas became 
known as exclusively Slavonic ; an assumption which allows 
the advocate of the German theory to say that, had our in- 
formation been a little earlier, we should have found what we 



PROLEGOMENA. XXIX 

want in the way of vestiges, fragments, and effects of the 
antecedent non-Slavonic aborigines. Be it so. Still the time 
is short. Bohemia — as we have seen — appears as an exclu- 
sively Slavonic country as early as a.d. 625. Is the differ- 
ences between these areas and the time of Tacitus suffi- 
cient ? 

Undoubtedly a great deal in the way of migration and 
displacement may be done in five hundred years, and still 
more in seven hundred ; yet it may be safely said that, under 
no circumstances whatever, within the historical period, has 
any known migration equalled the rapidity and magnitude of 
the one assumed, and that under no circumstances has the 
obliteration of all signs of an earlier population been so 
complete. 

How could the displacement inferred from this utter obliter- 
ation, have taken place ? Was it by a process of ejection, so 
that the presumed immigrant Slavonians conquered and ex- 
pelled the original Goths ? The chances of war, when we get 
to the historical period, run the other way ; and the first 
fact which we know concerning those self-same Slavonians, 
who are supposed to have dispossessed the Germans in the 
third and fourth centuries, is that, in the ninth, the Germans 
dispossessed them. But, perhaps, the Germans were more 
warlike in the time of Charlemagne than before. Not so ; 
witness the names of Alaric, Euric, Theodoric, Clovis, &c. 

If this view will not suffice, let us try another. Let us 
ask if it may not be the case, that, when those Germans, who 
are admitted to have left their country in great numbers, 
migrated southwards, they left vast gaps in the population of 
their original areas, which the Slavonians from behind filled 
up, even by the force of pressure ; since geography abhors a 
vacuum as much as nature is said to do. 

I will not say that this view is wholly unsupported by in- 
duction. Something of the kind may be found amongst the 
Indians of North America, where a hunting-ground abandoned 
by one tribe is appropriated by another. The magnitude, 
however, of such vacuities is trifling compared with the one 
in question ; besides which, the Indian migrations are those 
of a pastoral people, who take their wives and children with 



XXX THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

them, and, consequently, leave behind them no means of pre- 
serving traces of their previous existence. 

History only tells us of German armies having advanced 
southwards. The conversion of these armies into national 
migrations is gratuitous. 

But if the area of the dispossessed Germans was thus 
remarkable, that of those who held their ground was not 
less so. 

Along the Danube there was, at the time of Tacitus, a 
real existence of Germans to the south of Bohemia and 
Moravia, and it extended so far eastwards as to come within 
the same degree of longitude as the supposed Goths of the 
Baltic. The Germans of the Danube were the Marcomanni ; 
perhaps the Quadi; and almost certainly, some of the ances- 
tors and vaunt-couriers of the Goths of Moesia in the third 
century. 

Now these kept their ground, being the only ones that are 
admitted to have done so. They did more ; they encroached 
permanently on their neighbours to the east. Strange, that 
the fact of lying south of a given degree of latitude, should 
thus have preserved those Germans of the Danube against 
those fierce Slavonians who (if we suppose the Lygii to have 
been Germans, and the Marcomanni to have occupied all 
Bohemia) so thoroughly exterminated their brethren to the 
north. It looks as if the fact of their having been personally 
engaged in warfare against Borne, had so sharpened their 
swords as to have endowed them with powers of resistance 
unknown north of the Bohemian frontier. Everywhere else 
the Germans retired ; between Bohemia and the Danube 
they encroached. 

Yet it was not for want of enemies that they thus kept 
their ground. Theirs was no locality especially favoured by 
peace. They had the same Slavonians to contend with that 
extinguished the supposed Germans of the Oder and Vistula, 
and they had the Romans as well. It is not strange that the 
ancestors of the Ostrogoths and Visigoths should have held 
out against these odds. It is strange that they should have 
been the only Germans w r ho did so. Surely this is a page 
in history which may be read differently ; and instead of 



PROLEGOMENA. XXXi 

supposing them to have been thus exceptional to their country- 
men, they may be considered as the only Germans of whose 
existence in the time of Tacitus we are sure. 

It was as little for the want of actual wars and migrations 
as for the paucity of hostile neighbours, that these exceptional 
Germans of the Danube are found, in the fourth, fifth, sixth, 
seventh, and eighth centuries, in the locality assigned to them 
by Tacitus in the second. 

There was much of each. This we know to have been 
the case. Of similar wars and similar migrations, on the 
Oder and Vistula, we know nothing ; we only assume them 
for the sake of accounting for a supposed change of popula- 
tion. 

Now it is certainly unscientific to attribute so much, in 
the way of displacement, to the wars and migrations of which 
we know nothing, when those which we do know are known 
to have done but little. On the real theatre of action, the 
Middle Danube, what is it that we find in the time of 
Tacitus? Romans, Germans, Slavonians, all on the Rhsetian 
and Pannonian frontier, the Romans having the lion's share 
of country. What in the time of Theodoric ? Germans, 
Romans, and Slavonians, the Germans possessing much of 
what the Romans had lost. This is what we see on the 
points illuminated by the clear light of history ; and the 
changes implied are but moderate. In the parts beyond, 
however, everything increases its dimensions. The wars are 
more exterminating, and the migrations longer, the displace- 
ments greater than anything known elsewhere. Is this the 
view which we get from that cautious induction which measures 
the unknown by the known, or is it a mere sketch of the 
imagination, where all things show larger in the twilight, and 
where anything may be assumed, because, though there is 
nothing to support an hypothesis, there is nothing to con- 
.tradict it? 

Necdum finitus Orestes. — The list of improbabilities against 
the doctrine of the double migration, are named legion. The 
inroad which so obliterated the eastern Germans of the 
Germania of Tacitus, was not exclusively Slavonic ; it was 
Lithuanic as well. Neither was the whole area which, in 



XXXli THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

the ninth century, was undoubtedly divided between these 
Lithuanians and Slavonians, absolutely German even in the 
eyes of Tacitus. At the mouth of the Vistula the JEstyii 
spoke a language like the British. 

Let these yEstyians, on the strength of their sermo Bri- 
tannica propior, be called the wow-Germanic portion of the 
so-called original Germanic area ; and — 

Let the Prussians, on the strength of their Lithuanic 
tongue, be called the wow-Slavonic portion of the same area as 
it appears in the 12th century. 

It will be found that the relation of the wow-Slavonic 
portion of the Slavonian period, was exactly that of the wow- 
Germanic portion during the Germanic period — i.e., both the 
JEstyians and Prussians occupied the same locality. 

Hence, the displacement of these Britanno- Germanic popu- 
lations (and the statement of Tacitus is as valid for the 
JEstyians speaking a language like the British as for any 
single fact connected with these parts) must ,- ave been accom- 
panied with a remarkable act of discrimination — since the 
parts occupied by the populations like the British became 
Lithuanic and not Slavonic, the remainder Slavonic and 
not Lithuanic. This nice appropriation of different parts of 
the different areas cannot be said to add to the probability 
of the migration which must be assumed. Such a migration, 
annihilating the population, traditions, and local names, and 
all the substantial realities of a vast district, and, yet, pre- 
serving the form of its ethnological area, is, to say the least, 
a very remarkable one ; since it gives us a phenomenon 
which is better ascertained in chemistry than in history, i.e., 
the phenomenon of replacement and substitution. 

A further consideration of the probabilities herein involved 
will be found in the notes on the word JEstyii. 

But it may be urged that the language of Tacitus respect- 
ing the lingua Britannica propior must not be taken too 
closely ? Granted. But what statement is more explicit. 
If we doubt or qualify this, why not doubt or qualify much 
more ; e.g., the Germanic position of the Lygii. This is what 
should be done. All that is required is consistency. 
But strange as is the accident, that the Prussian conquest should 



PROLEGOMENA. XXXlll 

exactly coincide with the area of the British language, it is 
not an isolated instance. 

In the time of Tacitus the parts between Moravia, Gal- 
licia, and Hungary were occupied by nations speaking three 
different languages — the German, the Pannonica lingua of 
Tacitus, and the Gallica lingua of Tacitus. 

At the present time three tongues meet in the same parts 
— the German, the Slovak, and the Polish of Gallicia, the 
Majiar of Hungary being a fourth ; but that is of late intro- 
duction. 

Now if we assume much migration for these parts, the 
migration must have been of the peculiar kind just indicated, 
a chemical migration, so to say, a migration plus substi- 
tution and replacement ; a migration which, whatever it did 
in the way of an indiscriminate abolition of all nationality, at 
least left the boundaries of three different languages, and 
their geographical relations to each other, much as it found 
them. 

Certain writers, however (as already stated), adopt the view 
of a German migration from the parts between the Elbe and 
Vistula sufficiently exhaustive of the original population to 
leave the country in a state of emptiness for the Slavonians of 
the parts farther eastwards to fill up. These, as they borrow 
their notion of a vacuum from the science of physics, may 
take their theory of replacement and substitution from the 
chemist. Valeat quantum. 

Such the displacement. Whence came those who effected 
it ? Not from the country east of the Guttones. There were 
no such Slavonians there. East of the Guttones (the supposed 
frontier people of Germany), the populations were wholly 
either Lithuanic or Finnic until the last few centuries, and 
are nearly so now. This, then, is no birthplace for the 
Slavonians of Mecklenburg and Pomerania. 

Did they come from the south — i.e., from Bohemia 1 No ! 
Bohemia, according to the hypothesis, was German, besides 
which, their language was, probably, less like the Bohemian 
than the Polish. 

Then they came from Poland? Not even this. Poland 
was occupied by Lygian Germans. 



XXXI v THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

They can be brought from no point nearer than the water- 
system of the Dnieper. Yet the water-system of the Dnieper 
will not give us the phenomenon required. The language of 
that river is eminently homogeneous (Russian); whilst the lan- 
guages of Saxony, Silesia, Bohemia, Poland, Pomerania, and 
Brandenburg, although all Slavonic, are spoken in nume- 
rous dialects and sub-dialects. To derive all this from the 
Dnieper is to deduce the whole from the part, the old from 
the new. 

We have now taken a measure of some of the improbabili- 
ties involved in the doctrine of a Slavonic migration to the 
Transalbian portion of the Germania, between the times of 
Tacitus and Charlemagne; and though they are undeniably 
great, their magnitude is only relative ; and a certain degree of 
evidence may overbalance them. Difficult as it is to believe 
that Poland was ever Germanic, there is, nevertheless, an 
amount of testimony which would make it credible. Had an 
observer like Crcsar visited the country in person, and known 
it as well as he knew Gaul, his did urn would, probably, have 
outweighed all other difficulties. On the other hand, had a 
writer of no character whatever classed it amongst the coun- 
tries of Germany, I should have troubled the reader with but 
few reasons for objecting to him, and have disposed of his 
evidence in a summary manner, by treating his statement as 
an error. 

The authority of Tacitus is intermediate to these two 
extremes. 

Implicit and uncritical belief is not always the highest tri- 
bute of respect. So far from finding any morbid feeling of 
pleasure in taking exceptions to the statements of a great 
writer like Tacitus, I have no hesitation in saying, that the 
more I have criticised the more I have found to admire. So 
numerous are the cases where an unscrutinizing adoption of 
his statements only mystifies us ! Whereas the admission of 
the slightest amount of fallibility gives us an important fact. 
Such, amongst others, is the statement concerning the lan- 
guage of the iEstyii, and of the Gothini (vid. nott, in vv.) 

More than this, the very latitude given to the term Germania, 
though wrong as far as the facts which it implies are con- 



PROLEGOMENA. XXXV 

cernecl, is scientifically correct. What Tacitus knew of the 
Germans of the south was, that they extended as far down 
the Danube as the frontier of Pannonia (say, the parts about 
Pesth) ; and he had no reason to imagine that their southern 
extension went one hairs-breadth further in an easterly 
direction than did their northern one ; or vice versa. Hence, 
the extension of their area, as far along the Baltic as it w r as 
known to reach along the Danube, was legitimate : subject, 
of course, to correction from further investigation ; and 
equally legitimate was the assumption that the Ligii and 
other populations of the intervening parts were German — since 
the reasoning ran thus — 

a. The southern Germans run thus far eastwards. 

b. The northern do the same. 

c. So do the parts interjacent. Subject, I say, to correction 
from absolute investigation this a priori view was strictly 
scientific ; and who shall say that Tacitus put it forth uncon- 
ditionally ? 

Again — had the Baltic been even less German than it 
actually was, it was only through Germans that it was known 
to the Greeks and Romans : what, then, was more natural 
than that the extent of the German sea-board upon it should 
be over-valued ? Like the present Danes with their occupancy 
of the Sound, their prominence exceeded their occupancy. 

These and similar considerations show that such inaccu- 
racies as we find in Tacitus are, so far from subtracting from 
his value as an authority, or from the respect due to his tes- 
timony, that they enhance his credit. Such as occur could 
hardly have been avoided ; and the only wonder is that there 
are so few of them. 

If, however, we deny this reasonable amount of inaccuracy, 
the thoroughly hypothetical character of the migrations in 
question cannot be too strongly stated, or too prominently 
exhibited. They are referable to one head, and to one head 
only, viz., the facts which they will explain. In and of 
themselves they are wholly unsupported — unsupported with- 
out, however, lying beyond the pale of observation. The 
countries to which they appertain were known (at least) 
well enough for Tacitus and others to write about. The 



XXXVI THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

Germans had their ancient songs that served as records. 
And what event so important as the previous loss and sub- 
sequent re-conquest of two-thirds of their indigenous soil ? 

In short, the migrations in question must come under the 
following conditions : — 

a. They must he of unparalleled magnitude and com- 
pleteness — 

b. Of unparalleled rapidity — 

c. Unrecorded in any history — 

d. Unrepresented by any tradition — 

e. Accompanied by the strange phenomenon of replacement 
and substitution ; and — 

/'. Effected by improbable agents.* 

§ IX. ETHNOLOGICAL CLASSIFICATION OP THE REMAINING EUROPEAN 
POPULATIONS. 

The third chapter has served to illustrate the principles of 
ethnological classification ; since it has shown that nations as 
different as the Icelander and the Swiss may he comprized 
in one general division ; in other words that a stock comprises 
populations as different from each other as the Bavarians, the 
Dutch, the Swedes, the Faroe Tslanders and the Americans 
of the United States. Hence the Gothic stock is one of the 
stocks of which we have a pretty clear idea. 

Another such a stock is the Classical. This comprises the 
Latins and Greeks — ancient and modern. Besides which it, 
to a certain extent, comprises the Spaniards, the Portu- 
guese, the French, certain Swiss populations, and the Wal- 
lachians ; in all of which countries the language is derived from 
the Latin ; the population being mixed, i.e., partly consisting 
of Eoman, partly of aboriginal blood. Now, recognising the 
great Classical stock as an ethnological equivalent to the 
Gothic, and comparing the extent to which a Wallachian 
differs from an Italian or a modern Greek of the other, we 
have a convenient measure of the import of the word stock ; 
since we see the amount of difference implied by it. 

* Viz. by that division of the European populations which, within the his- 
torical period, has retreated before the Germanic rather than encroached on it. 



PROLEGOMENA. XXXVll 

Besides the Classical and Gothic, there are five other stocks 



in Europe ; or, changing the expression, the whole 
population of Europe may be thrown into seven groups. 
Three of these have already been mentioned — the Gothic, the 
Sarmatian, the Classical. 

The fourth, the Keltic, comprises the ancient Gauls of 
Gallia, and the ancient Britons of England, as well as the 
present Bretons of Brittany, Welsh of Wales, Manxmen of 
the Isle of Man, and Gaels of Ireland and Scotland. 

The Ugrians, or Finns, make the fifth group ; and a large 
group it is. Besides which it is the only one common to 
Europe and Asia. Lapland, Finland, Esthonia, and Hun- 
gary, are the present Finn or Ugrian areas in Europe. In 
Hungary, however, the Finn population is of recent intro- 
duction, the present Ugrian indigence, being the Lapps, Fin- 
landers, and Esthonians. 

The Basques of the Pyrenees, the only remnants of the old 
Iberian population of Spain, form the sixth stock. 

The Albanians of Albania the seventh. 

The Turks of Turkey, and the Maltese, are not enumerated ; 
not being indigenous. 



J X. VALUATION OP ETHNOLOGICAL GROUPS BY THE WRITERS OF 
ANTIQUITY. 

It is not enough to know how a modern writer classifies 
the varieties of his species. The reader of Tacitus must try 
to ascertain the view that the ancients took of them. We 
must not be surprised to find it less scientific than our own. 

Of the Classical stock they had a clear notion ; i.e., they 
put at its full value the differences between the group to which 
they themselves belonged, and the groups to which the so- 
called Barbarians belonged. But this notion was clear in 
one direction only. It only comprehended the points of 
difference. The resemblances which brought the Slavonians 
and Goths into the same group with themselves — the group 
called Indo-European — were unknown. 

Between a Goth, a Kelt, and a Sarmatian, in their more 
extreme forms, they also drew a clear distinction ; although 



xxxviii the Germany oe tacitus. 

their way of denoting it was less precise than our own, and 
not always expressed in the same terms. 

Of the Ugrians they knew little. Nevertheless, Tacitus 
and others distinguish between the Finns and the Germans. 

The Albanians, I think, were distinguished from the Greeks 
clearly ; but from the nations on their northern frontier in- 
distinctly. The term Illyrian comprises the Albanians, and 
to hi (thing more. 

The Iberians were clearly distinguished from all other 
stocks but the Keltic — from that indistinctly. 

Upon the whole, the ancients may be said to have over- 
valued the difference between themselves and the other six 
stocks, and to have undervalued the difference between the 
other groups of Europe ; and this is just what the Spaniards 
and English did and do with the present American abori- 
gine?;. 

These observations have been made upon the assumption 
that the only point which required illustration was the extent 
to which the ancients and moderns differed in their views of 
the same phenomena ; an assumption which supposes that the 
number of stocks at the beginning of the historical period was 
neither more nor less than it is at present, and that their 
mutual relations were the same. This, however, may not 
have been the case. Stocks may have become extinct ; or, 
instead of the broad and trenchant lines of demarcation which 
now separate the great groups from each other, there may 
have been a series of imperceptible transitions. In either of 
these cases it would be incorrect to say that the modern view 
is more scientific than the ancient. The latter, instead of 
seeing the same things in a different light, may have seen a 
different state of things. 



PROLEGOMENA. XXXIX 



§ XI. ON CERTAIN ISOLATED MEMBERS OF THE GERMAN FAMILY 
REAL OR SUPPOSED. 

The connexion of the American with the Englishman is 
clear. Nearly as clear is that between the Englishman and 
the German. In either case there has been a continuous 
extension of the original population ; and that within the 
period of clear and authentic history. 

But what if we found Englishmen in countries which no 
Englishman was known to have invaded? isolated English- 
men ? Englishmen cut off from the rest of their nation and 
language ? In this case we should have a truly ethnological 
fact ; since history, properly so called, would be silent. 

Or what if we found apart from the other Germans, simi- 
larly isolated populations, whose language was indeed German, 
but of an uncertain affinity — connected with the Dutch as 
much as the English, the Norse as much as the Frisian. 

What if the language were lost, and nothing but similarity 
of manners, or some vague tradition connected them with the 
assumed parent stock ? 

The problem would become still more complicated. 
Now such problems really exist. There are Goths beyond 
the pale of England, America, Germany, and Scandinavia. 
They require notice. 

1. The Germans of the Vicentine. — Two (perhaps more) 
passages mention the reception, on the part of Theodoric the 
Ostro-Goth, of certain Alemannic Germans, within the 
boundaries of Italy. One is a letter of his own to Clovis : — 
" Motus vestros in fessas reliquias temperate : quia jure 
gratise merentur evadere, quos ad parentum vestrorum defen- 
sionem respicitis confugisse. Estote illis remissi, qui nostris 
finihus celantur exterritir — Cassiod. Variar. ii. 41. 

The other is from the Panegyric of Ennodius : — " Quid 
quod a te Alamanniw generalitas intra Italia, terminos sine 
detrimento Romanse possessions inclusa est? cui evenit ha- 
bere regem, postquam meruit perdidisse. Facta est Latiaris 
custos imperii semper nostrorum populatione grassata. Cui 



xl THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

feliciter cessit fugisse patriam suam, nam sic adepta est soli 
nostri opulentiani."" 

At the present moment the Sette communi near Verona, 
and the Tredice communi near Vicenza, are inhabited by an 
isolated population, whose language is a peculiar, and insuf- 
ficiently studied, dialect of the German — apparently of the 
High-German division. The Alemanni of the time of Theo- 
doric are the Germans, whom this settlement is most generally 
supposed to represent. 

•2. The Germans of the Crimea. — Procopius mentions 
under the name of YotOol Terpa^trai, a small Gothic po- 
pulation on the Pains Mreotis — 'H Mtn&m? KaXovpivrj Xtpuvrj 

€<i T1)V UKT1]V 7T0VT0V TOV Ev%€LVOV T«9 €K§o\a<i TTOieiTCU . . 

irapd he. tov ^copov avrov, odev 77 t% Xlp^vr]^ i/c£o\r) ap- 
X €Tai '> YotOol oi Terpa^tTat /caXov/xevot, coKrjvrau, ov 7ro\\ol 
ovres — Bell. Goth. iv. 4. 

He praises the bravery with which they withstood the 
Utuguri.* 

In the following extract the 'AGaayol are the Circassians 
with whom these Goths came more in contact than any other 
Europeans : — Eire he tt}<? Apeiov So^s iyevovro irore o[ 
YotOol ovtol, coairep /cal rd aWa YotOlku eOvrj, elre real 
aX\o tl ap,(pl rfi So^rj clvtols ijafcrjro, ovk eyw elirelv, eirel 
ovhe aurol laaatv, aXX" d<pe\e(a re ravvv Kal dirpayp^ocrvvrj 
TToWfj Tifjboicrt tt/v Sotjav. Ovtol oXljo) irporepov {Xeyco he, 
yvLKa Trpoirov t€ Kal elfcoo-rov ero9 , IovcTTLVtav6<i /3aai\ev<; 
T7]v ai/TOKpdropa et%ev dpyr/v) 7rpecr@ei<; rerrapa^ e? Bv^dv- 
tiov e7refjb-^rav, eirlcricoiTOV a(pLO~L rtvd heopbevoL hovvav eirel 
ocrTt? fxev avTols iepevs rjv, TeTeXevrrjfcei ov 7toX\o> irporepov^ 
"Eyvcoaav he 009 Kal A§aayol<; lepea /3ao~ikevs eTre/uyjre, Kal 
avrols TrpoOvpLorara J lovo~Tiviavb<s /Sacr^Xei;? e7rne\r) iroirjcras 
tt)v Serjcnv aTreTTepb-^aro. — Bell. Goth. iv. 4. 

In the eighth century they withstand the Khazars : — 
Outo? 6 ocrios irarrip rjp,(t)V 'Itodvvrjs eVicr/co7ro9 fy Yor6la<i 
eirl KcovaravTiVov Kal AeovTO? rcov fiacrtXewv, 6pp,cop,evo<; e/c 
T779 irepaTLKrjs rav TavpoaKvOcov 7779, rr}? vtto rrjv yoapav 
riav Y6t0g>v Te\ovar)<i, ip,7roptov Xeyopuevov YiapOevLTOiV) 
* Probablv allied to the Huns. 



PROLEGOMENA. xli 

Aeoi/ro9 Kal <S>(0T6ivf)<; i/to? yeyovws . . . 6 Se oaios ovtos eVt- 
o"/co7T09 'Icodvvrjs fiera ravra fxeTa tov l&lovXaov T049 dpyovai 
tcov Xa^dpcov i^eS66r], Sod to o-varadrjvat avTco rat Kvplai 
Yordias, Kal rots dpyovcnv avTOv Kal iravrl ra> \aa>, 737509 
to fiy KaTaKvpcevaat 7-779 %<wpa? avTwv tovs elpTj/jbivovs 
Xa^dpovs. \7roo-Teika<i yap 6 Xaydvos "jrape\a§e to /cdo~Tpov 
avTOiV to Xeyo/xevov Aopbs, $e/xevo9 iv avTa> tyvkaKas 
TogaTovs, oy? Kal efeoYwfev 6 elprjfievos 00-409 eTria-Koiros 

jjueTa tov Xaov avTOv, Kal tus far) a ov pas eKpaTrjaev Vit. 

S. Joannis, ex Ood. Vatic, ap. Boll. Jun. 5, 190, 191. 

a.d. 1255, they spoke German : — " II y a des grands pro- 
montoires ou caps sur cette iner depuis Kersona jusquaux 
embouchures du Tanais et environ quarante chateaux entre 
Kersona et Soldaia, dont chacun a sa langue particuliere. II 
y a aussi plusieurs Goths, qui retiennent encore la langue 
Allemander — Reis. Rubruquis. 

So they did in 1436: — " Dritto dell' isola di Capha 
d 1 intorno, ch' e su '1 mar maggiore, si truoua la Gothia, e poi 
F Alania, laqual va per F isola verso Moncastro . . Gothi par- 
lano in Todesco. So questo, perche havendo un famiglio 
Todesco con me, parlauano insieme et intendeuansi assai 
ragioneuolmente, cosi come s' intenderia un Furlano con un 
Fiorentino." — Josafa Barbaro. 

a.d. 1557 — 1564, Busbequius describes the appearance of 
one of them as " procerior, toto ore ingenuam quandam sim- 
plicitatem prse se ferens, ut Flander videretur aut Batavus."" 
He further learned — " gentem esse bellicosam, quae complures 
pagos hodieque incoleret, ex quibus Tartarorum regulus, cum 
expediret, octingentos pedites sclopetarios scriberet, prsecipuum 
suarum copiarum firmamentum : primarias eorum urbes alteram 
Mancup vocari, alteram Sciuarin^ 

Finally, he gives a short vocabulary of their language. — 
See Legatio Turcica. 

The nearest representatives of the proper Goths of the Lower 
Danube are these Goths of the Crimea, whose language is now 
said to be extinct, but who require further investigation. 

The Germans of both the Vicentine and the Crimea are well 
authenticated, and unequivocally Germanic populations. This 
is not the case with — 



xlii THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

3. The Germans (?) of Canuola. — In Zeuss we have the 
following extract — one from an old, the other from a modern 
writer : — 

a. Procop. Bell. Goth. i. 15, "TirepOe Be avTwv (Bev€- 
Tioov) 'EtcTKioi re Kal 2ovd£oc (ov^ ol <$>pdy<ya)V tcarrj/cooi, 
dXkd irapd tovtovs erepoc) %cbpav tijv p^eaojecov e^ovcri, 

Kal V7T6p TOVTOVS KdpVlOL T€ Kal NovpiKol iSpWTai. 

b. Lazius de Migratione Gentium : — " Quae declarant, 
Justiniano adhuc imperante Suevos ditionem in Liburnia 
habuisse, interque Dravnm Savumque amnes et Istriam 
rernm fnisse potitos. Imo adluic nostra tempestate et reli- 
quiaa et posteritatem snperesse constat, etsi a Slavinis in 
angustias redactam, locoque arcto ac nemoroso GotscJiee con- 
clusam, nbi oppidulum cum paucis castris, multisque pagis 
manet, quorum incohe in medio Slavinorum non solum Ger- 
manic-am sonant, verum etiam Suevicam pronunciationem pra> 
ferunt."— P. 363. 

The name Gotschee is mentioned by Constantinus Porphyro- 
genita — Kal 6 Boavo? avrwv /cparel rrjv KplSaaav, rqv 
Ait&v, Kal Tijv Tovrfyfca. — De Administ. Imp. c. 30. 

The term Gotschee is sufficiently like Goth to indicate 
an etymology in that quarter ; but upon this Zeuss remarks 
that, " this is no reason for so deriving it, since the form 
Goduscani * admits of another etymology, viz., Godesca from 
god, bonus.' 1 '' — " Der Name hat Anklang mit dem der Gothen, 
gibt aber darum noch keinen Grand zur Ableitung derGotscheer 
aus diesem Volke, da die Schreibung Goduscani noch andere 
Etymologie (Godisca aus god, bonus) zulasst. 11 — Zeuss, 591. 

It is more important to verify the statement of Lazius 
than to speculate on it ; but it is so doubtful whether this 
can be done, that it is only because the Gotschee population 
has been recognized by good writers as Germans, that it 
finds a place at all in the present volume. The following 
facts stand against the extract from Lazius : — 

1. The absence of any other testimony to the previous 
existence of Goths in Carniola. 

2. The absence of any traces of them at present. 

* The Latin form of the word. 



PROLEGOMENA. xliii 

3. The likelihood of Procopius having meant, by Sovdgoi, 
the Slavonians of the river Save ; whilst the similarity of 
the word to Suevi misled Lazius. 

4. The conjunction of the Gotscheer, as Goduscani, with 
the Slavonic Obotrites of the Danube (so-called), and the 
equally Slavonic Timociani, in an embassy to Louis in 
a.d. 818, as well as in other Slavonic alliances. 

§ XII. ON THE MILITARY AND OTHER COLONIES OF THE GERMANIC 
AND NON-GERMANIC AREAS. 

The frontier between the Germanic Thuringians, and the 
Slavonic Sorabians, or Sorbs, at the beginning of the his- 
torical period, was the river Saale. 

Yet there were Slavonian populations west of this — even 
on the Upper Mayne and Neckar, and in other quarters 
equally Germanic. 

Thus — " De possessionibus S. Bonfatii martyris preescrip- 
tus venerabilis Abbas Vuerinharius pari mutuatione con- 
cambii dedit in jus et proprietatem S. Mauritii martyris 
quicquid in Frekenleba, et Scekkensteti, Arneri, Lembeki et 
Faderesrod, Kerlingorod, Mannesfeld, Duddondorf, Rodon- 
vualli, Menstedi, Purtin et Elesleiba aliisque villis villa- 
rumque partibus quas Slavuaniae familite inhabitant . . . 
visus est habere." — Docum. a.d. 973. 

And, again, earlier still, in a.d. 846. — " Qualiter 

domnus Karolus .... episcopis preecepisset, ut in terra 
Sclavorum, qui sedent inter Moinum et Radantiam fluvios, 
qui vocantur Moinu-winidi et Eatanz-winidi." 

Taken by themselves, these passages suggest the notion that, 
great as are the limitations placed by the present writer upon 
the accredited Germanic area of Tacitus, they are still insuffi- 
cient ; in other words, that the Slavonic frontier should be 
brought even further westward. 

Similar passages also occur in respect to the parts about 
the Hartz which (taken by themselves) lead to the same con- 
clusion. 

They must not, however, be taken by themselves. The 
system of military colonies, or, if not military colonies, of the 



Xliv THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

forcible removal of conquered populations, which we find to 
have been practised by the Kings of Persia and Assyria, was 
also practised by the later Roman Emperors. It was also 
practised by more than one Germanic conqueror — though the 
exact time when the system began is difficult to ascertain. 
A system, however, it was — " Decern millia hominum ex his, 
qui utrasque ripas Albis flumims incolebant, cum uxoribus et 
parvulis sublatos transtulit, et hue atque illuc per Galliam et 
Germaniam multimoda divisione distribuit." 

This is related by Eginhard of the great enemy of the 
Saxons — Charlemagne. 

Again — " Misit imperator (Charlemagne also) scaras suas 
in Wimodia et in Hostingabi et in Rosogavi, ut illam gentem 
foras patriam transduceret ; nee non et illos Saxones, qui 
ultra Albiam erant, transduxit foras, et divisit eos in reg- 
num suum ubi voluit. 11 — Chronicon Moissiac. ad an. 804. 
(Pertz i. 307.) 

The following is a double removal : — " ^Estate in Saxoniam 
ducto exercitu, omnes qui trans Albiam et in Wihmuodi 
habitabant Saxones cum mulieribus et infantibus transtulit in 
Franciam, et pagos transalbianos Abotridis dedit. 11 — Annal. 
Einhard. ad an. 804. (Pertz i. 191.) 

Lastly — " In diebus illis surrexerunt de populo Holzatorum 
amplius quam sexcenta) familise, transmissoque amne abierunt 
via longissima, quwrentes sibi sedes opportunas, ubi fervorem 
persecutionis declinarent. Veneruntque in monies ffarticos, 
et manserunt ibi, ipsi et filii et nepotes eorum usque in hodier- 
num diem. 11 — Helm. Chron. Slav. i. 26. 

The Frisians, Dutch, and Saxons seem to have been the 
chief colonists of this kind : — " Neque illse fraudes locorum, 
nee . . perfugia silvarum barbaros tegere potuerunt, quominus 
ditioni tuse divinitatis omnes sese dedere cogerentur, et cum 
conjugiis ac liberis, ceteroque examine necessitudinum ac rerum 
suarum ad loca olim deserta transirent, ut quae fortasse ipsi 
quondam deprsedando vastaverant, culta redderent serviendo : 
arat ergo nunc milii Chamavus et Frisius et ille vagus, ille 
praedator exercitio squalidus operatur et frequentat nundinas 
meas pecore venali, et cultor barbarus laxat annonam. 1 ' — 
Eumenii Panegyr. in Maxim, cc. 8, 9. 



PROLEGOMENA, xlv 

For the particular colony of the Warasci, see note in v. 

Narisci. 

In the same neighbourhood (i.e., on the Doubs) were 
several pagi of — 

a. The Commavi, Amavi, taking as a later form, the name 
pagus Ammaus, Emaus, and Amausensis — 

b. The Athoarii, Attoarii, Hatuarii, or Hatoarii. 

There can be little doubt but that these were Chamavi 
and Chattuarii removed from their original localities. 

The detail of such colonies is a point of minute ethnology. 
They are mentioned here, however, for the sake of showing 
that the presence of certain populations in certain localities, 
is to be taken with caution. They may exist without the 
parts about them being similarly occupied. In which case 
the population is sporadic. 

Now, in order to constitute a true ethnological area, a 
population must not be isolated, unconnected, or sporadic, but 
continuous. 

§ XIII. GERMANIC AREA OF TACITUS. 

The Germany of Tacitus extends from the Rhine to the 
parts about the amber-country of Oourland on the north, and 
as far as Gallicia on the south : to each of which countries 
we have special allusions. 

For the intermediate portion of Europe, the frontier is 
carried at least as far as the most eastern of these points ; and 
possibly farther — possibly farther, because the central nation 
of the Lygii, whose country coincides with the modern king- 
dom of Poland, is described as a large one. 

With these limits it includes Mecklenburg, Brandenburg, 
Pomerania, East and West Prussia, Saxony, Silesia, Bohemia, 
and Poland. 

By the Germany of Tacitus, I mean Tacitus according to 
the usual interpretation ; without either affirming or denying 
that his text requires this extent of country to verify it. 



xlvi THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 



§ XIV. CERTAIN MODERN ADDITIONS TO THE GERMANIC AREA OF 
TACITUS. 

It by no means follows that, because the Germania of 
Tacitus constitutes a very large tract of country, the whole of 
the area occupied by the Germanic stock was therefore known 
to that author. 

He writes that it was separated from Dacia and Sarmatia 
montibus aut mutuo metu. 

This is not the language of a precise geographer — indeed, 
precise geography for the parts in question was in Tacitus's 
time an impossibility. 

Hence, any writer who may hold that there Mas a Germany 
or Germans, either to the north or to the east of the limits 
ascribed in the Germania, holds nothing unreasonable. The 
Dacians and Sarmatians might only have interrupted the out- 
line of that area ; in which case Germans might re-appear on 
the Lower Danube, or in Western Russia, Germans of whom 
Tacitus knew nothing, and of whom he had lost sight on 
reaching the Dacian and Sarmatian frontier. 

There is nothing unreasonable in all this ; and the likelihood 
of the Germanic area of Tacitus being smaller, is just as open 
a question as the likelihood of its being larger, than the real 
one. Individually, I believe it to be too wide;* but that is 
no reason why others should not consider it too narrow. 

This has been done. The greatest authority of Germany 
has expended much learning and ingenuity (language more 
favourable than this cannot be applied to even the arguments 
of the great author of the Deutsche Grammatik) on what 
may be called the Getic hypothesis. 

Let it be admitted that the chances against the name of a 
locality reached by a body of emigrants, invaders, or con- 
querors, being identical with that of the locality from which 
those emigrants, invaders, or conquerors started, are almost 
infinite. 

Thus, the chances are almost infinite against the native 
New Zealand name of the locality of the present settlement 
* Though only in its eastern direction. Its northern area was too small. 



PROLEGOMENA. xlvii 

of Canterbury, being Canterbury also. Nor yet any name 
very similar to it, such as Canterberg, Kentbury, &c. 

Though this is an extreme case, it illustrates the points of 
question — it being assumed, of course, that the similarity is 
wholly accidental. If Englishmen had been there previously, 
the case would be different. The similarity would then be 
other than accidental ; and a connexion of some sort or other 
between the district in which the settlement took place, and the 
district from which the settlers originated would account for it. 

No one imagines Boston in Massachusets to be a native 
Indian name. Yet why should it not be so I Not because 
the combination was either impossible or improbable for an 
Indian ; but because it is the name of a town in England — 
from whence some of the settlers came, or upon which they 
had their eye. Such is the fact ; and it is a fact which 
we should have been nearly as sure of, if the details of the 
foundation of Boston of Massachusets were unknown, as we 
are now. 

The presence of Englishmen in the two Bostons would 
have been conclusive ; the chances against a people con- 
nected with one Boston falling in accidentally with another 
Boston ready-made (as it were) in respect to name, being 
incalculably great. 

But what if the Boston in Massachusets were the older 
name of the two ? Difficulties would arise. We could not 
then derive it from the Boston in Lincolnshire. 

It is not necessary to carry this hypothetical illustration 
farther : mutatis mutandis, the argument which it involves 
applies to the Goths and the Geta. 

a. The names are alike : indeed by the later writers Geta, 
is used as equivalent to Gothic ; and in Pliny we find Gauda 
by the side of Geta. 

b. The supposed country of the Goths is Germany : the 
undoubted country of the Geta is the Lower Danube. 

c. Of the two names that of the Geta is the older. 

In this case we really have the difficulty so lately indicated. 

Emigrants, with the name Gothi, leave Germany; and, of 
all the countries in the world, settle in one belonging to a 
people with a name so like their own as that of the Geta acci- 



xlviii THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

dentally. It may safely be said, that if this has happened at 
all, it has happened against great odds. 

Yet the solution is obscure ; we cannot well suppose the 
Grothi to have migrated from the land of the Geta ; whilst 
the notion that the Get<z came from the Gothi, is set aside by 
the greater antiquity of the former name (Getce). 

Is there any other explanation \ 

In what may be called the Getic hypothesis, it is held that 
the Goths were Getse, and the Getaa Goths, from the be- 
ginning ; in other words, the second of the assumed facts is 
denied, viz., the origin of the Goths in Germany, and the mi- 
gration from that country. There was no migration at all. The 
Goths were on the Lower Danube from the beginning, and they 
were known to the earlier Greek and Latin writers as Getse. 

Such the doctrine. Now, as there is the evidence of more 
than one good writer of antiquity, as to the Thracians being in 
the same category with the Gette, the Thracians must have 
been Gothic as well. Hence the questions involved in the 
hypothesis in question are of considerable magnitude. 

Such is the point of view from which the views developed 
in Grimm's History of the German Language, must be 
seen in the first instance. The details by which it is sup- 
ported are elaborate, but eminently unsatisfactory. Reasons 
for thinking them unnecessary are given in the sequel,* where 
the difficulty arising from the similarity of name is admitted, 
but differently explained. 

§ XV. ON NATIVE AND FOREIGN NAMES. 

The natives of the British Principality are called by the 
English Welsh. They call themselves Kymry. 

The natives of the rest of South Britain call themselves 
English. Their Welsh (Kymry) neighbours call them Sasse- 
nach = Saxons. So do the Scotch and Irish Gaels. So do 
the Manksmen of the Isle of Man. 

The Germans call themselves Deutsche. The English call 
no one but the people of Holland Dutch. They call the 
other allied families Germans. 

* Epilegomena, in § on the Goths. 



PROLEGOMENA. xlix 

The people of Finland call themselves Quains. Most of 
their neighbours call them Finns. 

The Laplanders call themselves Sabme (Same). The Nor- 
wegians call them Finns. Finmatk means Lap-moxk. 

The hill-tribes of India have no collective name at all. 
Each tribe has its separate denomination. The collective 
names KhoncL Bhil, Sur, &c, are all Hindu. 

The Slavonians vary the name with the nation. The 
Germans they call Niemcy, the Finns Tshud. 

The Germans call all Slavonians Wends. No Slavonian 
calls himself so. 

This list of the difference between native and foreign 
designations might be greatly extended. The present in- 
stances merely illustrate the extent to which the difference 
occurs. 

In ancient writers we are seldom sure of the name applied 
to a given population being native. We should rather look 
for it in the language of the population that supplied the 
information. 

From which it follows that we can rarely assume that any 
name belongs to the language of the population to which 
it applies; and this creates a difficulty too often overlooked. 

I never allow myself to assume this indigenous origin of a 
national name, except under the following circumstances:— 

1. When the information concerning a nation is known to 
be drawn from the nation itself at first-hand. — Thus, all that 
CfEsar writes concerning the Germans I attribute to Gallic 
sources ; and, consequently, assume the names to be Gallic 
also. They may be German as well ; but this is an accident. 
He may also in certain exceptional cases have taken the 
German designation. The general rule, however, is, that 
the name belongs to the language of the informants. 

2. When the name has a meaning in the language to 
which it applies. — Thus, Marc-o-manni is so truly German 
that, even in Caesar, I believe it to be native. How often it 
may be safe to assume such a meaning is another question. 

3. When the name is one out of two or many. — Believ- 
ing (as, with many better judges, I do) that the words 
Catti and Suevi are different names for the same people, and 



1 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

also believing that, next to the Gauls, the Germans them- 
selves supplied the Romans with information concerning 
Germany, I consider it more likely that one of the two 
should be German and native, than that either the Germans 
or the Gauls should have used two synonymous designations. 

4. When the name of the nation is the same as that of 
some national hero. — Thus, the fact that the Greeks recog- 
nized Hellen as the patriarch of their stock would, even if it 
stood alone, be good reason for considering the name Hellenes 
to be indigenous. 

o. When the name contains a sound found in the language 
to which it applies, but not found in the language of the 
most likely informants — E.g., I believe the word Thule to 
have been taken direct from some Norse informant, because 
it contains the Norse sound of ]> (th), a sound too rare to be 
supposed to have come from another language. 

(I. When the aame is very particular and specific. — The 
names that one nation gives another are mostly generic and 
collective. They have seldom a vocabulary sufficiently full 
for the divisions and subdivisions of any family but their 
own. On the other hand, a very generic and collective 
power is prima facte evidence of the name to which it is 
attached not being native. 

Writers, from whom it is unsafe to differ — as far as they 
go on any principles at all, and exercise any doubt whatever 
upon the subject — will possibly add another characteristic of 
indigenous use. They may consider that the general and 
undoubted vernacular use of a given name at one period may 
be a conclusive argument in favour of its vernacular use 
originally. The natural reluctance of a whole nation to take 
to itself a designation given it by another, may be urged in 
favour of this view. I submit, that this is entirely a ques- 
tion of degree ; and that it depends on the relative influence 
and importance of the two nations involved. The modern 
name Belgium is, undoubtedly, anything but native, i.e., in 
its immediate application. It is a Roman word, in a Roman 
form, and all that can be said in favour of its Belgic character 
is, that the country to which it applies supplied the Latin 
language with the most essential part of it. Nevertheless, it 



PROLEGOMENA. li 

is a word of Roman make ; one which never has been deve- 
loped in the country itself. 

That it is foreign we know ; and we know it because it 
has been assigned within the memory of man. But what if 
it had been assigned in the obscure days of the third and 
fourth centuries I It would undoubtedly have passed for 
native. 

At the same time I admit that, in order for one nation to 
adopt the name by which it is known to another, there 
must be a very favourable combination of circumstances ; 
e.g.— 

a. There must be a considerable difference in the power 
of the two populations; the weaker taking the name from 
the stronger only when the fact of its relative weakness 
is evident. 

h. Or there must be intermixture. 

c. Or there must be more than one nation to use the 
foreign term, whilst only one upholds the native. 

Contrary to many, I am dissatisfied with the evidence which 
makes two very important words native and German — 
Suaiia (Suevi) and Saxon. I think each of these was di- 
rectly Roman, and remotely Keltic. Hence, to the objection 
against their %ow-Germanic character, founded upon their 
undoubted adoption by undoubted German populations, I 
suggest the fact that their adoption was favoured by the 
support of two languages (the Roman and the Keltic) against 
the German single-handed. 

More specific reasons will be found in the sequel.* At 
present I merely illustrate a line of criticism. 



§ XVI. LIMITATIONS IN THE WAY OF ETYMOLOGY. 

The etymology of national names is generally considered 
a powerful instrument in ethnological research. 

It is doubtful, however, whether much has been done by it. 

Few writers admit any one's etymologies but their own. 
This is a proof of the arbitrary method in which the practice 
is carried out, 

* Epilegomena, § Suevi. 

e 2 



Hi THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

In the name Cherusci sonic of the best writers of Germany 
find the root heru = sword. Hence, the Cherusci are sivords, 
and, by extension, swords-men. 

But there is another nation mentioned by Tacitus, called 
Suard-ones. Snard = sword ; and, hence, Cherusci — Suard- 
ones, and vice versa. 

Thirdly, as sahs = dagger ; dagger = sword, the Saxons are 
the men of the sahs. Hence, /Saxon = Suardones = Cherusci, 
and the three tribes are the same. 

I give this as an illustration of an investigation; valuable, 
if true. But the truth is doubtful. 

In most investigations of this sort, two series of facts are 
overlooked. 

1. The language to which the derivational process is 
applied. — How many have sought for a German meaning 
to the word Germani, without submitting it to the previous 
inquiry as to whether the name were German at all. 

2. The likelihood of the name itself. — I will not deny 
that nations may be found who give themselves such names 
as Sword, Dagger, Knife, &c. I only argue that the induction 
by which such names can be shown fitting to an unknown 
ease, has yet to be made. 

A fact that eminently invalidates this kind of criticism, 
is the habit of numerous nations themselves. Many of them 
are so far from supposing that their name has an intelligible 
origin, that they exhibit an unconscious confession of their 
ignorance. The Greeks (for instance) and many Oriental 
nations explain their name by supposing that it is that of 
the patriarch of their stock — their eponymus. Thus the 
Hellenes derive themselves from Hellen, the Turks from 
Turk, &c. They would not do this if, in the full command 
of their own tongue, and in a period comparatively near 
the origin of their name, there was some custom or attri- 
bute connected with themselves which would explain it 
better. 

I think the etymology of simple uncompounded national 
names dangerous and unscientific. In a few cases it is admis- 
sible — but only in a few. In the present volume I adopt the 
accredited meaning of three simple uncompounded names only 



PROLEGOMENA. liii 

— Franks,* ^Estyi,-\ Jazyges.\ With compounds and deri- 
vatives, it is different. One part of the word helps to verify 
another, and so error gets guarded against. 

In compound words, then, only — such as Marc-o-manni, 
and Boio-hemum (with the three exceptions given above) 
shall I allow myself to argue from the etymology to any 
ulterior conclusion. 



§ XVII. ON THE TERM MARCOMANNI. 

In respect to its form, Marc-o-manni is one of the most 
satisfactory words of antiquity. 

It first appears in Caesar's notice of the subjects and 
allies of Ariovistus. The fact of Caesar's informants being 
Gauls, and the greater part of his nomenclature being Gallic, 
is the only difficulty that accompanies the notion of the 
German being the language in which its meaning is to be 
sought. 

But this is only the shadow of a shade ; inasmuch as the 
undoubtedly German authorities, in which it afterwards 
occurs, do away with all doubt as to the tongue to which it 
belongs. 

Nevertheless, why this should be German, when Csesar's 
other names are Gallic, is not so easy to say. 

Its form is full and perfect. There are the two elements 
which make it a compound (mark + man) and the copula 
(-0-) which connects them. 

Mark = march, and mann = man, so that Marc-o-manni 
= men of the marches. 

From this derivation I draw three points of great im- 
portance in the practice of ethnological criticism, points 
which, so far as I am aware, have never been sufficiently 
attended to ; at any rate, they have never been made the 
basis of so much inference as they will be in the following 



1. The first of these is the possibility of the number of 
Marc-o-manni being numerous ; as numerous as the number 

* See Epilegomena, § Franks. t See Note ad, voc. 

t See Page 16. 



liv THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

of the marches. Something of the kind has been admitted; 
and March/men, over and above those of Ariovistns and the 
Mareoniannic war, have been recognised. But not to the 
extent necessary to do away with the difficulties of the 
question. The Gallic march, on the confines of Germany and 
Gaul — the Slavonic march, falling into different divisions 
according to the different parts of the lengthy frontier — the 
Eoman march, on the confines of those parts of Vindelicia, 
and the Decumates Agri which acknowledged the supremacy 
of the empire — and the Northern march, on the side of the 
unascertained frontier of Sleswick-Holstein — each, or any of 
these, may have supplied the name Marc-o-manni. I do not 
say that they all have done so. I only say that such may 
have been the case. If so, how hasty it is to assume that 
the Marc-o-manni of different times and different localities are 
one and the same representatives of a separate substantive 
nation as truly as Cherusci or Chamavi are — locomotive, 
migratory, and well-nigh ubiquitous. No one in England 
imagines that the history of the Welsh Marchmen, is that 
of the Marchmen of the Scottish border, and that the front- 
agers which we find in Shropshire and Chester, are descend- 
ants of those of Westmoreland and Cumberland; bodily 
moved from one area to another by migration — or, vice versa. 
No ! There were as many Marchmen as Marches, and as 
many Marches as frontiers. I do not, at present, say that 
the Marcomanni of Ariovistus and the Marcomanni of Maro- 
boduus belonged to different sections of the Germanic stock ; 
since what is written, at present, is meant as an illustration 
rather than an argument. I only say that it is likely that 
they did so — the one being the Marchmen of the Gallic, the 
other the Marchmen of the Rhaeto-Vindelican, or Rhajto- 
Pannonian march ; possibly as different from each other as 
the retainers of the ancient lords of the marches of Alnwick 
and Ludlow respectively. 

2. The next is the strong likelihood of the great majority 
of the marches of the ancient Marcomanni coinciding with 
the boundaries of different stocks, races, varieties, or whatever 
we call those great divisions of the human species which we 
designate by the terms Gothic, Slavonic, and Keltic. I say 



PROLEGOMENA. lv 

great likelihood, because I am unwilling to overstate the case. 
Marks of minor magnitude may have existed — marks between 
different members of the same stock ; between, for instance, 
the Oatti and Cherusci, the Cherusci and Chauci, &c. This, 
again, is what we find at home. The Welsh marches sepa- 
rated the Saxon from the Kelt : the Scottish, the southron 
Saxon from the northern. Still I think that the existence of 
a march, sufficiently important to be mentioned by the Roman 
historians, is prima facie evidence of the existence of an 
ethnological difference of considerable magnitude. 

3. The third is the linear character of the dimensions of a 
march. A boundary which separates one area from another 
is surely narrower than either of the areas which it separates. 
A march as broad as it is long is no march at all. To this, 
however, there is an objection. One nation may so encroach 
upon another that the march, or line of boundaries, is con- 
tinually advancing. Now if the name be retained whilst the 
line becomes protruded, the breadth of a march may become 
as notable as its length. Thus, if the North American 
settlers had called each county which abutted on the Indian 
frontier the march, and if those counties had retained their 
names, there would now be a series of areas, so named, 
reaching from the Atlantic to the Rocky Mountains. And 
this is really the case in Germany, where we have the oldest 
line of frontier between the Slavonians and Germans, called 
Alt-mark (the old march) ; the next, Mittel-mark (the middle 
march) ; and the third, Ucker-mark the march of the Ucrii 
(a Slavonic population so-called). 

4. There is also another element of uncertainty. Suppose 
the Humber was called the river March. The people on it 
might be called Marchmen, though not on a march. In such 
a case, certain Yorkshiremen would appear to form the fron- 
tier, when, really, they did not do so. By this, the writer 
who argued from the name only would imagine that the 
non-English area began at Hull instead of at Roxburgh ; 
and the English area would lose all Yorkshire, Durham, and 
Northumberland. 

Now, reverse this supposition, and let the Spey be called 
the March. In this case, the men on its banks would appear 



hi THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

to form the frontier, when, really, it was on the Tweed. By 
this, the writer, who argued from the name only, would ima- 
gine that the non-English area was at Cromarty instead of 
Roxburgh, and the English area would lose all Fife, Aber- 
deen, and the Lothians. 

Now Metros, a word not unlike March, is the name of the 
river of Moravia, and Moravia is in the neighbourhood of the 
Marc-o-manni. 

Notwithstanding these objections, I shall use the term 
Marc-o-manni as an instrument of criticism, and (to antici- 
pate) Bohemia is the country in which it will most especially 
be applied. 



§ XVlll. IRREGULARITY OF SIZE OF ETHNOLOGICAL AHEAP. 

It is probable that I may appear too careless about the 
size I give to certain ethnological areas, e.g., the Frisian, the 
Slavonic, and others ; so as to look like a writer who finds 
his Frisians, his Slavonians, or his any other equally-favoured 
nation everywhere. 

To anticipate this, I remark, that not only are large areas 
— areas far larger than any given to any population in the 
following pages — the commonest of ethnological phenomena, 
but that they generally stand in the neighbourhood of small 
ones; so that the contrast between a multiplicity of ethno- 
logical differences within a small area, and great ethnological 
uniformity over a large one, is the normal condition of the 
world. Thus — 

a. In Asia — the vast Turk, Mongol, Chinese, and Persian 
areas, are contrasted with the small ones of the Caucasian, 
Himalayan, and Siberian populations. 

b. In Africa — the Berber and KafFre are similarly great ; 
the Felup, Sapi, Nalu, &c, similarly small. 

c. In America — the Eskimo, Athabaskans, Algonkins, and 
Guarani take up half of the continent. On the lower Missis- 
sippi there are eight or ten mutually unintelligible tongues 
within an area the size of Yorkshire. 



PROLEGOMENA. lvii 



§ xix. Cesar's notices of the Germans. 

Of so much more importance than the remarks of all other 
writers upon Germany are those of Caesar, that the chief 
extracts from the Bellum Gallicum bearing upon that country 
will be given in extenso. They require, however, certain 
preliminary remarks. 

First comes the distinction between what Caesar observed 
for himself and what he learned from others. Of these latter, 
his chief informants were Gauls, and chief amongst the Gauls, 
most probably, Divitiacus the JEduan. The parts of Ger- 
many which an .ZEduan would best understand would be 
those of the Middle Rhine — Hesse, Franconia, and the 
northern parts of Suabia. The name by which these Ger- 
mans were known was Suevi. 

Another point to notice, is the likelihood of the Germans 
thus described having spoken Gallic to the Gauls, instead of 
the Gauls having learned German : inasmuch as there is the 
special statement that Ariovistus spoke the language of the 
country he had invaded ; and that it was in Gallic that he 
made himself intelligible to the Romans. There is no evi- 
dence of any Gaul speaking German. 

Hence, it will not be surprising if many of the names in 
Caesar are as little German as the name Welsh is Cambrian. 
Without, at present, saying how far such is the case, it is 
enough to remark that, amongst the German populations of 
Caesar, there is only one whereof the name is unequivocally 
German, as tested by its structure and etymology. This 
word is 3farcomanni = Marchmen, or men of the boundaries. 

Of the Germans of Ariovistus, Caesar's knowledge was 
personal ; but these were intrusive emigrants rather than 
true Germans, i.e., Germans in a Gallic locality, and (proba- 
bly for that reason) partially Gallicised. The Germans for 
the parts between Bonn and Nimeguen, were also similarly 
known. 

Lastly, he speaks from his study of previous writers, 
quoting Eratosthenes for the extent and name of the 
Hercynian forest. 



lviii THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

That Oa?sar was the chief first-hand authority for the 
main details concerning early Germany, is evident; at the 
same time it is not in Ceesar that the classification into 
Inga?vones, Istsevones, &c, is to be found. Neither is it in 
Caesar that the parts which were not visited until after his 
time are described. The broad distinction between Ganl and 
German is his ; the Gaul being taken as the type. 

The extent to which the names in Ca?sar differ from 
those of Tacitus creates certain slight difficulties. His no- 
mention of the Catti is a most remarkable instance of this. 
That Caesar's names are chiefly Gallic, whilst Tacitus's are 
Germanic, is, in the mind of the present writer, the chief 
explanation here. 

The greatest difficulty lies in the second and third ex- 
tracts, wherein certain Belgian populations are made Ger- 
man. I can only reconcile this with the great preponderance 
of evidence in favour of the Belga? being Gauls, by consider- 
ing the term Belgic in the book of Caesar to be political 
rather than ethnological ; in other words, to denote a con- 
federation rather than a homogeneous nation. At the same 
time we may admit both intermixture * and intrusion. 

These preliminaries precede the following extracts ; the 
criticism of which will find its place in different parts of the 
body of the book. 

CJ&8. BELL. GALL. I. 

XXX. Bello Helvetiorum confecto, totius fere Gallia? 
legati, principes civitatum, ad Cassarem gratulatum conve- 
uerunt : " intelligere sese, tametsi, pro veteribus Helvetiorum 
injuriis populi Romani, ab iis pcenas bello repetisset, tamen 
earn rem non minus ex usu terra? Gallia?, quam populi Ro- 
mani accidisse , propterea quod eo consilio florentissimis rebus 
domos suas Helvetii reliquissent, uti toti Gallia? bellum in- 
ferrent, imperioque potirentur, locumque domicilio ex magna 
copia deligerent, quern ex omni Gallia opportunissimum ac 
fructuosissimum judicassent, reliquasque civitates stipen- 
diarias haberent.' n Petierunt, " uti sibi concilium totius Gallia? 
in diem certam indicere, idque Ca?«aris voluntate facere 
* See Epilegomena, § on the Quasi-Germanic populations. 



PROLEGOMENA. lix 

liceret : sese habere quasdam res, quas ex communi consensu 
ab eo petere vellent." Ea re permissa, diem concilio con- 
stituerunt et jurejurando, ne quis enunciaret, nisi quibus 
communi consilio man datum esset, inter se sanxerunt. 

XXXI. Eo concilio dimisso, iidem principes civitatum, 
qui ante fuerant ad Ceesarem, reverterunt petieruntque, 
uti sibi secreto in occulto de sua omniumque salute cum eo 
agere liceret. Ea re impetrata, sese omnes flentes Caesari ad 
pedes projecerunt : " non minus se id contendere et laborare, 
ne ea, quae dixissent, enunciarentur, quam uti ea, quae vellent, 
impetrarent, propterea quod, si enunciatum esset, summum 
in cruciatum se venturos viderent.'" Locutus est pro his 
Divitiacus iEduus : " Gallise totius factiones esse duas ; 
harum alterius principatum tenere iEduos, alterius Arvernos. 
Hi quum tantopere de potentatu inter se multos annos conten- 
derent, factum esse, uti ab Arvernis Sequanisque Germani 
mercede arcesserentur. Horum primo circiter millia xv. 
E-henum transisse : posteaquam agros et cultum et eopias 
Gallorum homines feri ac barbari adamassent, transductos 
plures ; nunc esse in Gallia ad c. et xx. millium numerum : 
cum his iEduos eorumque clientes semel atque iterum armis 
contendisse : magnam calamitatem pulsos accepisse, omnem 
nobilitatem, omnem senatum, omnem equitatum amisisse. 
Quibus proeliis calamitatibusque fractos, qui et sua virtute, et 
populi Romani hospitio atque amicitia plurimum ante in 
Gallia potuissent, coactos esse Sequanis obsides dare, nobi- 
lissimos civitatis, et jurejurando civitatem obstringere, sese 
neque obsides repetituros, neque auxilium a populo Romano 
imploraturos, neque recusaturos, quo minus perpetuo sub 
illorum ditione atque imperio essent. Unum se esse ex omni 
civitate iEduorum, qui adduci non potuerit, ut juraret, aut 
liberos suos obsides daret. Ob earn rem se ex civitate pro- 
fugisse et Romam ad senatum venisse, auxilium postulatum, 
quod solus neque jurejurando neque obsidibus teneretur. Sed 
pejus victoribus Sequanis, quam iEduis victis, accidisse, prop- 
terea quod Ariovistus, rex Germanorum, in eorum finibus 
consedisset tertiamque partem agri Sequani, qui esset optimus 
totius Gallise, occupavisset et nunc de altera parte tertia 
Sequanos decedere juberet, propterea quod paucis mensibus 



lx THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

ante Harudum* millia homiiuim xxiv. ad eum veuissent, 
quibus locus ac secies pararentur. Futurum esse paucis 
annis, uti omnes ex Gallia) finibus pellerentur atque omnes 
Germani Rhenum transirent : neque enim conferendum esse 
Gallicum cum Gerinanorum agro, neque hauc consuetudiuem 
victus cum ilia comparandam. Ariovistum autem, ut semel 
Gallorum copias prcelio vicerit, quod prcelium factum sit ad 
Magetobriam, superbe et crudeliter imperare, obsides nobi- 
lissimi cujusque liberos poscere et iu eos omnia exempla 
cruciatusque edere, si qua res non ad nutum aut ad volun- 
tatem ejus facta sit : bominem esse barbarum, iracundum, 
temerarium : non posse ejus imperia diutius sustineri. Nisi si 
quid in Csesare populoque Romano sit auxilii, omnibus Gallis 
idem esse faciundum, quod Helvetii fecerint, ut domo 
emigrent, aliud domicilium, alias sedes, remotas a Germaiiis 
petant fortunamque, quaacumque accidat, experiantur. Hajc 
si enuiiciata Ariovisto sint, non dubitare, quin de omnibus 
obsidibus, qui apud eum sint, gravissimum supplicium sumat. 
Csesarem vel auctoritate sua atque exercitus, vel recenti 
victoria, vel nomine populi Romani deterrere posse, ne major 
multitudo Germanorum Rbenum transducatur ; Galliamque 
omnem ab Ariovisti injuria posse defendere. 11 

XXXII. Hac oratione ab Divitiaco habito, omnes, qui 
aderant, magno fletu auxilium a Cajsare petere cceperunt. 
Animadvertit Caesar, unos ex omnibus Sequanos nihil earurn 
rerum facere, quas ceteri facerent, sed tristes, capite demisso, 
terram intueri. Ejus rei caussa quae esset miratus ex ipsis 
quaesiit. Nihil Sequani respondere, sed in eadem tristitia 
taciti permanere. Quum ab iis ssepius queereret, neque ullam 
omiiino vocem exprimere posset, idem Divitiacus iEduus 
respondit : " Hoc esse miseriorem gravioremque fort imam 
Sequanorum prae reliquorum, quod soli ne in occulto quidem 
queri, neque auxilium implorare auderent, absentisque Ario- 
visti crudelitatem, velut si coram adesset, horrerent : prop- 
terea quod reliquis tamen fugse facultas daretur ; Sequanis 
vero, qui intra fines suos Ariovistum recepissent, quorum 
oppida omnia in potestate ejus essent, omnes cruciatus essent 
perferendi. 11 
* When a name is printed in Italics, it will be noticed in the Epikgumena , 



PROLEGOMENA. Ixi 

XXXIII. His rebus cognitis, Csesar Gallorum animos 
verbis confirmavit, pollicitusque est, sibi earn rem curse 
futuram : magnam se habere spem, et beneficio suo, et auc- 
toritate adductum Ariovistum finem injuriis facturum. Hac 
oratione habita, concilium dimisit, et secundum ea multee res 
eum hortabantur, quare sibi rem cogitandam et suscipiendam 
putaret ; imprimis quod iEduos, fratres consanguineosque 
ssepenumero a senatu adpellatos, in servitute atque in ditione 
videbat Germanorum teneri, eorumque obsides esse apud 
Ariovistum ac Sequanos intelligebat : quod in tanto imperio 
populi Romani turpissimum sibi et reipublicse esse arbitra- 
batur. Paullatim autem Germanos consuescere Rhenum 
transire ; et in Galliam magnam eorum multitudinem venire, 
populo Romano periculosum videbat : neque sibi homines 
feros ac barbaros, temperaturos existimabat, quin, quum 
omnem Galliam occupassent, ut ante Cimbri Teutonique 
fecissent, in provinciam exirent atque inde in Italiam conten- 
derent ; praesertim quum Sequanos a provincia nostra Rhoda- 
nus divideret. Quibus rebus quam maturime occurrendum 
putabat. Ipse autem Ariovistus tantos sibi spiritus, tantam 
adrogantiam sumserat, ut ferendus non videretur. 

XXXIV. Quamobrem placuit ei, ut ad Ariovistum 
legatos mitteret, qui ab eo postularent, uti aliquem locum 
medium utriusque colloquio diceret ; velle sese de republica 
et summis utriusque rebus cum eo agere. Ei legationi Ario- 
vistus respondit : " Si quid ipsi a Csesare opus esset, sese ad 
eum venturum fuisse ; si quid ille se velit, ilium ad se venire 
oportere. Prseterea se neque sine exercitu in eas partes 
Galliee venire audere, quas Caesar possideret ; neque exercitum 
sine magno commeatu atque emolimento in unum locum 
contrahere posse : sibi autem mirum videri, quid in sua 
Gallia, quam bello vicisset, aut Csesari, aut omnino populo 
Romano negotii esset." 

XXXV. His responsis ad Csesarem relatis, iterum ad 
eum Caesar legatos cum his mandatis mittit : " Quoniam tanto 
suo populique Romani beneficio adfectus, quum in consulatu 
suo rex atque amicus a senatu adpellatus esset, hanc sibi 
populoque Romano gratiam referret, ut in colloquium venire 
invitatus gravaretur, neque de communi re dicendum sibi et 



Ixii THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

cognoscendum putaret ; haec esse, quae ab eo postulavet ; 
primum, ne quam hominum multitiulinem amplius trans 
Rhenum in Galliam transduceret : deinde obsides, quos 
haberet ab iEduis, redderet Sequanisque permitteret, ut, quos 
illi haberent, voluntate ejus reddere illis liceret ; neve iEduos 
injuria lacesseret, neve his sociisve coram bellum inferret : si 
id ita fecissit, sibi populoque Romano perpetuam gratiam 
atque amicitiam cum eo futuram : si non impetraret, sese, 
quoniam M. Messala, M. Pisone Coss. senatus censuisset, uti, 
quicumque Galliam provinciam obtineret, quod commodo 
reipublicae facere posset, iEduos ceterosque amicos populi Ro- 
mani defenderet, sese iEduorum injurias non neglecturam. 1, 

XXXVI. Ad hrcc Ariovistus respondit : "Jus esse 
belli, ut, qui vicissent, iis, quos vicissent, quemadmodum 
vellent, imperarent : item populum Romanum victis non ad 
alterius praescriptum, sed ad suum arbitrium imperare con- 
suesse. Si ipse populo Romano non prsescriberet, quemad- 
modum suo jure uterctur ; non oportere sese a populo 
Romano in suo jure impediri. iEduos sibi, quoniam belli 
tbrtunam tentassent et armis congressi ac superati essent, 
stipendiaries esse fhctos. Magnam Csesarem injuriam facere, 
qui suo adventu vectigalia sibi deteriora faceret. iEduis se 
obsides redditurum non esse, neque iis, neque eorum sociis 
injuria bellum illaturum, si in eo manerent, quod convenisset, 
stipendiumque quotaunis penderent ; si id ncn fecissent, 
longe iis fraternum nomen populi Romani afuturum. Quod 
sibi Caesar denunciaret, se iEduorum injurias non neglecturum ; 
neminem secum sine sua pernicie contendisse. Quum vellet, 
congrederetur ; intellecturum, quid invicti Germani exercita- 
tissimi in armis, qui inter annos quatuordecim tectum non 
subissent virtute possent." 

XXXVII. Hsee eodem tempore Csesari mandata refere- 
bantur, et legati ab iEduis et a Treviris veniebant : iEdui 
questum, quod Harudes, qui nuper in Galliam transportati 
essent, fines eorum popularentur ; sese ne obsidibus quidem 
datis pacem Ariovisti redimere potuisse : Treviri autem, 
pagos centum Suevorum ad ripas Rheni consedisse, qui 
Rhenum transire conarentur ; iis prseesse Nasuam et Cim- 
berium fratres. Quibus rebus Csesar vehementer commotus, 



PROLEGOMENA. lxiii 

maturandum sibi existimavit, ne, si nova manus Suevorum 
cum veteribus copiis Ariovisti sese conjunxisset, minus facile 
resisti posset. Itaque re frumentaria, quam celerrime potuit, 
comparata, magnis itineribus ad Ariovistum contendit. 

XXXVIII. Quum tridui viam processisset, nunciatum 
est ei, Ariovistum cum suis omnibus copiis ad occupandum 
Vesontionem, quod est oppidum maximum Sequanorum, con- 
tendere, triduique viam a suis finibus processisse. Id ne acci- 
deret, magno opere sibi prsecavendum Caesar existimabat : 
namque omnium rerum, quse ad bellum usui erant, summa 
erat in eo oppido facultas ; idque 'natura loci sic muniebatur, 
ut magnam ad ducendum bellum daret facultatem, propterea 
quod flumen Dubis, ut circino, circumductum, pame totum 
oppidum cingit : reliquum spatium, quod est non amplius 
pedum dc, qua flumen intermittit, mons continet magna 
altitudine, ita ut radices montis ex utraque parte ripa? flumi- 
nis contingant. Hunc murus circumdatus arcem efficit et cum 
oppido conjungit. Hue Csesar magnis nocturnis diurnisque 
itineribus contendit, occupatoque oppido, ibi prsesidium collocat. 

XXXIX. Dum paucos dies ad Vesontionem rei fru- 
nientarige commeatusque caussa moratur, ex percunctatione 
nostrorum vocibusque Gallorum ac mercatorum, qui ingenti 
magnitudine corporum Germanos, incredibili virtute atque 
exercitatione in armis esse praedicabant, ssepenumero sese 
cum eis congressos ne vultum quidem atque aciem oculorum 
ferre potuisse, tantus subito timor omnem exercitum occupavit, 
ut non mediocriter omnium mentes animosque perturbaret. 
Hie primum ortus est atribunis militum, praefectis reliquisque, 
qui, ex urbe aniicitise caussa Csesarem secuti, non magnum in 
re militari usum habebant : quorum alius, alia caussa illata, 
quam sibi ad proficiscendum necessariam esse dicerent, pete- 
bant, ut ejus voluntate discedere liceret : nonnulli, pudore 
adducti, ut timoris suspicionem vitarent, remanebant. Hi 
neque vultum fingere, neque interdum lacrimas tenere pote- 
rant : abditi in tabernaculis aut suum fatum querebantur, aut 
cum familiaribus suis commune periculum miserabantur. 
Vulgo totis castris testamenta obsignabantur. Horum voci- 
bus ac timore paullatim etiam ii, qui magnum in castris usum 
habebant, milites centurionesque, quique equitatu praeerant, 



Ixiv THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

perturbabantur. Qui sc ex his minus timidos existimari 
volebant, non se hostcm vereri, sod angustias itineris ct 
magnitudinera silvarum, qure intercederent inter ipsos atque 
Aviovistum, aut rem frumentariam, ut satis commode suppor- 
tari posset, timere dicebant. Nonnulli etiam Cajsari renun- 
ciabant, quum castra moveri ac signa ferri jussisset, non fore 
dieto audientes milites, neque propter timorem signa laturos. 
XL. Haec quum animadvertisset, convocato consilio, 
omniumque ordinnm ad id consilium adhibitis centurionibus, 
vehementer cos incusavit : 'primum, quod, aut quam in 
partem, aut quo concilio dueerentur, sibi quserendnm aut 
cogitandum putarent. Ariovistum, se consule, cupidissime 
populi Romani amicitiam adpetisse; cur hunc tarn temere 
quisquam ab officio discessurum judicaret ? Sibi quidem per- 
suaderi, cognitis suis postulatis atque sequitate conditionum 
perspecta, cum neque suam, neque populi Romani gratiam 
repudiaturum. Quod si furore atque amentia impulsus bellum 
intulisset, quid tandem vererentur ? aut cur de sua virtute, 
aut de ipsiua diligentia desperarent ? Factum ejus bostis 
periculum patrum nostrorum memoria, quum, Oimbris et 
Teutonis a C. Mario pulsis, non minorem laudem exercitus, 
quam ipse imperator, meritus videbatur : factum etiam nuper 
in Italia servili tumultu, quos tamen aliquid usus ac disciplina 
quam a nobis accepissent, sublevarent. Ex quo judicari 
posset, quantum baberet in se boni constantia ; propterea 
quod, quos aliquamdiu inermos sine caussa timuissent, hos 
postea armatos ac victores superassent. Denique hos esse 
eosdem, quibuscum ssepenumero Helvetii congressi, non solum 
in suis, sed etiam in illorum finibus, plerumque superarint, qui 
tamen pares esse nostro exercitui non potuerint. Si quos 
adversum proelium et fuga Gallorum commoveret, hos, si 
quaererent, reperire posse, diuturnitate belli defatigatis Gallis, 
Ariovistum, quum multos menses castris se ac paludibus 
tenuisset, neque sui potestatem fecisset, desperantes jam de 
pugna et dispersos subito adortum, magis ratione et consilio, 
quam virtute, vicisse. Cui rationi contra homines barbaros 
atque imperitos locus fuisset, hac ne ipsum quidem sperare 
nostros exercitus capi posse. Qui suum timorem in rei fru- 
mentarise simulationem angustiasque itinerum conferrent, 



PROLEGOMENA. Ixv 

facere adroganter, quum aut de officio imperatoris desperare 
aut prsescribere viderentur. Hsec sibi esse curse ; frumentum 
Sequanos, Leucos, Lingonas snbministrare ; jamque esse in 
agris frumenta matura ; de itinere ipsos brevi tempore judi- 
catures. Quod non fore dicto audieutes milites, neque signa 
laturi dicantur, nihil se ea re commoveri : scire enim, quibus- 
cumque exercitus dicto audiens non fuerit, aut, male re gesta, 
fortuuam defuisse ; aut, aliquo facinore comperto, avaritiam 
esse convictam. Suam innocentiam perpetua vita, felicitatem 
Helvetiorum bello esse perspectam. Itaque se, quod in lon- 
giorem diem collaturus esset, reprsesentaturum et proxima 
nocte de quarta vigilia castra moturum, ut quam primum 
intelligere posset, utrum apud eos pudor atque officium, an. 
timor valeret. Quod si preeterea nemo sequatur, tamen se 
cum sola decima legione iturum, de qua non dubitaret ; sibi- 
que earn preetoriarn cohortem futuram.'" Huic legioni Osesar 
et indulserat prascipue, et propter virtutem confidebat 
maxime. 

XLI. Hac oratione liabita, mirum in modum conversse 
sunt omnium mentes, summaque alacritas et cupiditas belli 
gerendi innata est, princepsque decima legio per tribunos 
militum ei gratias egit, quod de se optimum judicium fecisset, 
seque esse ad bellum gerendum paratissimam confirmavit. 
Deinde reliquse legiones per tribunos militum et primorum 
ordinum centuriones egerunt, uti Csesari satisfacerent : se 
neque umquam dubitasse, neque timuisse, neque de summa 
belli suum judicium, sed imperatoris esse, existimavisse. 
Eorum satisfactione accepta et itinere exquisito per Divitia- 
cum, quod ex aliis ei maximam fidem habebat, ut millium 
amplius quinquaginta circuitu locis apertis exercitum duceret 
de quarta vigilia, ut dixerat, profectus est. Septimo die, 
quum iter non intermitteret, ab exploratoribus certior factus 
est, Ariovisti copias a nostris millibus passuum quatuor et 
viginti abesse. 

XLII. Cognito Csesaris adventu, Ariovistus legatos ad 
eum mittit : quod antea de colloquio postulasset, id per se 
fieri licere, quoniam propius accessisset : seque id sine peri- 
culo facere posse existimare. Non respuit conditionem 
Ca3sar : jamque eum ad sanitatem reverti arbitrabatur, 

/ 



Ixvi THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

quum id, quod antea petenti denegasset, ultro polliceretur; 
magnamque in spem veniebat, pro suis tantis populique 
Romani in cum beneficiis, cognitis suis postulatis, fore, uti 
pertinacia desisteret. Dies colloquio dictus est, ex eo die 
quintus. Interim quum ssepe ultro citroque legati inter eos 
mitterentur, Ariovistus postulavit, ne quern peditem ad col- 
loquium Csesar addueeret : vereri se, ne per insidias ab eo 
circumveniretur : uterque cum equitatu veniret ; alia ratione 
se non esse venturum. Csesar, quod neque colloquium inter- 
posita caussa tolli volebat, neque salutem suam Gallorum 
equitatui committere audebat, commodissimum esse statuit, 
omnibus equis Gallis equitibus detractis, eo legionarios milites 
legionis decimae, cui quam maxime confidebat, imponere, ut 
presidium quam amicissimum, si quod opus facto esset, 
haberet. Quod quum fieret, non irridicule quidam ex mili- 
tibus decimse legionis dixit: "plus, quam pollicitus esset, 
Caesarem ei facere : pollicitum, se in coliortis prsctoria? loco 
decimam legionem habiturum, nunc ad equum rescribere. 1 ' 

XLIII. Planicies or.it magna, et in ea tumulus terrenus 
satis grandis. Hie locus requo fere spatio ab castris utrisque 
aberat. Eo, ut erat dictum, ad colloquium venerunt. Le- 
gionem Ctesar, quam equis devexerat, passibus ducentis ab 
eo tumulo constituit. Item equites Ariovisti pari intervallo 
■constiterunt. Ariovistus, ex equis et colloquerentur et, 
pra?ter se, denos ut ad colloquium adducerent, postulavit. 
Ubi eo ventum est, Oassar initio orationis sua senatusque 
in eum beneficia commemoravit, " quod rex adpellatus esset 
a senatu, quod amicus, quod munera amplissima missa : 
quam rem et paucis contigisse, et pro magnis hominum 
officiis consuesse tribui " docebat : " ilium, quum neque adi- 
tum, neque caussam postulandi justam haberet, beneficio ac 
liberalitate sua ac senatus ea prsemia consecutum." Docebat 
etiam, " quam veteres, quamque justse caussse necessitudinis 
ipsis cum iEduis intercederent, qua? senatus consulta, quoties, 
quamque honorifica in eos facta essent : ut omni tempore 
totius Gallia? principatum .ZEdui tenuisent, prius etiam, quam 
nostram amicitiam adpetissent ; populi Romani hanc esse 
consuetudinem, ut socios atque amicos non modo sui nihil 
deperdere, sed gratia, dignitate, bonore auctiores velit esse: 



PROLEGOMENA. Ixvii 

quod vero ad amicitiam populi Romani adtulissent, id iis 
eripi, quis pati posset ? " Postulavit deinde eadem, quse 
legatis in mandatis dederat, " ne aut iEduis, aut eorum sociis 
bellura inferret ; obsides redderet ; si nullain partem Ger- 
manorum domum remittere posset, at ne quos amplius 
Rhenum transire pateretur." 

XLIV. Ariovistus ad postulata Caesaris pauca respondit: 
de suis virtutibus multa prsedicavit : " Transisse Rhenum 
sese, non sua sponte, sed rogatuni et arcessitum a Gailis ; 
non sine magna spe magnisque praemiis domum propinquos- 
que reliquisse ; sedes habere in Gallia, ab ipsis concessas ; 
obsides ipsorum voluntate datos ; stipendium capere jure belli 
quod victores victis imponere consuerint ; non sese Gailis, sed 
Gallos sibi bellum intulisse ; omnes Gallia? civitates ad se 
oppugnandum venisse, ac contra se castra habuisse ; eas 
omnes copias a se uno prcelio fusas ac superatas esse ; si 
iterum experiri velint, iterum paratum sese decertare ; si pace 
uti velint, iniquum esse, de stipendio recusare, quod sua 
voluntate ad id teinpus dependerint. Amicitiam populi 
Romani sibi ornamento et preesidio, non detrimento, esse 
oportere, idque se ea spe petisse. Si per populum Romanum 
stipendium remittatur et dedititii subtrahantur, non minus 
libenter sese recusaturum populi Romani amicitiam, quam 
adpetierit. Quod multitudinem Germanorum in Galliam 
transducat, id se sui muniendi, non Gallise impugnandce 
caussa facere : ejus rei testimonium esse, quod, nisi rogatus, 
non venerit, et quod bellum non intulerit, sed defenderit. Se 
prius in Galliam venisse, quam populum Romanum. JVum- 
quam ante hoc tempus exercitum populi Romani Galliee pro- 
vincial fines egressum. Quid sibi vellet I Cur in suas 
possessiones veniret 1 Provinciam suam hanc esse Galliam, 
sicut illam nostram. Ut ipsi concedi non oporteret, si in 
nostros fines impetum faceret : sic item nos esse iniquos, qui 
in suo jure se interpellaremus. Quod fratres a senatu iEduos 
adpellatos diceret, non se tarn barbarum, neque tarn im- 
peritum esse rerum, ut non sciret, neque bello Allobrogum 
proximo ^Eduos Romanis auxilium tulisse, neque ipsos in his 
contentionibus, quas .ZEdui secum et cum Sequanis habuis- 
sent, auxilio populi Romani usos esse. Debere se suspicari, 

/2 



lxviii THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

simulata Csesarem amicitia, quod exercitum in Gallia 
habeat, sui opprimendi caussa habere. Qui nisi decedat 
atque exercitum deducat ex his regionibus, sese ilium non 
pro amico, sed pro hoste habiturum : quod si eum inter- 
fecerit, multis sese nobilibus principibusque populi Romani 
gratum esse faeturum : id se ab ipsis per eorum nuncios 
compertum habere, quorum omnium gratiam atque amici- 
tiam ejus morte redimere posset. Quod si decessisset et 
liberam possessionem Galliae sibi tradidisset, magno se 
ilium pmeinio remuneraturum et, qiuecurnque bella geri vellet, 
sine ullo ejus labore et periculo confecturum." 

XLV. Multa ab Caesare in earn sententiam dicta sunt, 
quare negotio desistere non posset, et " neque suam, neque 
populi Romani consuetudinem pati, uti optime meritos socios 
desereret : neque se judicare, Galliam potius esse Ariovisti, 
quam populi Romani. Bcllo superatos esse Arvernos et Rutenos 
ab Q. Fabio Maximo, quibus populus Romanus ignovisset, 
neque in provinciam redegisset, neque stipendium imposuisset. 
Quod si antiquissimum quodque tempus spectari oporteret, 
populi Romani justissimum esse in Gallia imperium : si judi- 
cium senatus observari oporteret, liberam debere esse Galliam, 
quam bello victam suis legibus uti voluisset. 1 ' 

XL VI. Dam hsec in colloquio geruntur, Csesari nun- 
ciatum est, equites Ariovisti propius tumulum accedere et 
ad nostros adequitare, lapides telaque in nostros conjicere. 
Caesar loquendi finem fecit seque ad suos recepit suisque im- 
peravit, ne quod omnino telum in hostes rejicerent. Nam 
etsi sine ullo periculo legionis delectse cum equitatu proelium 
fore videbat ; tamen committendum non putabat, ut, pulsis 
hostibus, dici posset, eos ab se per fidem in colloquio circum- 
ventos. Posteaquam in vulgus militum elatum est, qua 
adrogantia in colloquio Ariovistus usus omni Gallia Romanis 
interdixisset, impetumque in nostros ejus equitis fecissent 
eaque res colloquium ut diremisset : multo major alacritas 
studiumque pugnandi majus exercitu injectum est. 

XLVII. Biduo post Ariovistus ad Csesarem legatos 
mittit, velle se de his rebus, quae inter eos agi coeptae, neque 
perfectse essent, agere cum eo: uti aut iterum colloquio diem 
constitueret ; aut, si id minus vellet, ex suis legatis aliquem 



PROLEGOMENA. Jxix 

ad se mitteret. Colloquendi Caesari caussa visa non est, et 
eo magis, quod pridie ejus diei Germani retineri non poterant, 
quin in nostros tela conjicerent. Legatum ex suis sese magno 
cum periculo ad eum missurum, et hominibus feris objec- 
turum existimabat. Commodissimum visum est, 0. Va- 
lerium Procillum, C. Valerii Caburi filium, summa virtute et 
humanitate adoleseentem (eujus pater a 0. Valerio Flacco 
eivitate donatus erat), et propter fidem, et propter linguae 
Gallicae scientiam, qua multa jam Ariovistus longinqua con- 
suetucline utebatur, et quod in eo peccandi Germanis caussa 
non esset, ad eum mittere, et M. Mettium, qui hospitio 
Ariovisti usus erat. His mandavit, ut, qua? diceret Ariovistus, 
cognoscerent et ad se referrent. Quos quum apud se in 
castris Ariovistus conspexisset, exercitu suo praesente, con- 
clamavit : " Quid ad se venirent ? An speculandi caussa \ " 
Oonantis dicere prohibuit et in catenas conjecit. 

XLVIII. Eodem die castra promovit et millibus pas- 
suum sex a Caesaris castris sub monte consedit. Postridie 
ejus diei prseter castra Csesaris suas copias transduxit et 
millibus passuum duobus ultra eum castra fecit, eo consilio, 
uti frumento commeatuque, qui ex Sequanis et iEduis sup- 
portaretur, Caesareni intercluderet. Ex eo die dies continuos 
quinque Caesar pro castris suas copias produxit et aciem 
instructam liabuit, ut, si vellet Ariovistus proelio contendere, 
ei potestas non deesset. Ariovistus his omnibus diebus exer- 
citum castris continuit ; equestri proelio quotidie contendit. 
Genus hoc erat pugnae, quo se Germani exercuerant. Equitum 
millia erant sex : totidem numero pedites velocissimi ac 
fortissimi ; quos ex omni copia singuli singulos, suae salutis 
caussa, delegerant. Cum his in proeliis versabantur, ad hos 
se equites recipiebant : hi, si quid erat durius, concurrebant : 
si qui, graviore vulnere accepto, equo deciderat, circumsiste- 
bant : si quo erat longius prodeundum, aut celerius recipi- 
endum, tanta erat horum exercitatione celeritas, ut, jubis 
equorum sublevati, cursum adaequarent. 

XLIX. Ubi eum castris se tenere Caesar intellexit, ne 
diutius commeatu prohiberetur, ultra eum locum, quo in 
loco Germani consederant, circiter passus sexcentos ab eis, 
castris idoneum locum delegit, acieque triplici instructa, ad 



1XX THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

eum locum venit. Priraam et secundum aciem in armis esse, 
tertiam castra munire jussit. Hie locus ab hoste circiter 
passus sexcentos, uti dictum est, aberat. Eo circiter hominum 
numero xvi. millia expedita cum omni equitatu Ariovistus 
misit, quae copiae nostros perterrerent et munitione prohiberent. 
Nihilo sccius Caesar, ut ante constituerat, duas acies hostera 
propulsare, tertiam opus perficere jussit. Munitis castris, 
duas ibi legiones reliquit et partem auxiliorum ; quatuor reli- 
quas in castra majora reduxit. 

L. Proximo die, instituto suo, Caesar e castris utrisque 
copias suas eduxit ; paullumque a majoribus progressus 
aciem instruxit hostibusque pugnandi potestatem fecit. Ubi 
ne turn quidem eos prodire intellexit, circiter meridiem exer- 
citum in castra reduxit. Turn demum Ariovistus parjem 
suarum copiarum, quae castra minora oppugnaret, misit : 
acriter utrimque usque ad vesperum pugnatum est. Solis 
occasu suas copias Ariovistus, multis et illatis et acceptis 
vulneribus, in castra reduxit. Quum ex captivis quaereret 
quam ob rem Ariovistus proclio non decertaret ; hanc 
reperiebat caussam, quod apud Germanos ea consuetude esset, 
ut matres familiae eorum sortibus et vaticinationibus declara- 
rent, utrum proelium committi ex usu esset, nee ne : eas ita 
dicere : " Non esse fas, Germanos superare, si ante novam 
lunam praelio contendissent." 

LI. Postridie ejus diei Caesar preesidio utrisque castris, 
quod satis esse visum est, reliquit, omnis alarios in conspectu 
bostium pro castris minoribus constituit, quod minus multi- 
tudine militum legionariorum pro hostium numero valebat, 
ut ad speciem alariis uteretur. Ipse, triplici instructa acie, 
usque ad castra liostium accessit. Turn demum necessario 
Germani suas copias castris eduxerunt, generatimque con- 
stituerunt paribusque inter vail is Harudes, Marcomannos, Tri- 
boccos, Vangiones, Nemetes, Sedusios, Suevos, omnemque 
aciem suam rhedis et carris circamdederunt, ne qua spes in 
fuga relinqueretur. Eo mulieres imposuerunt, quae in proelium 
proficiscentes milites passis crinibus flentes implorabant, ne se 
in servitutem Romanis traderent. 

LII. Caesar singulis legionibus singulos legatos et quaes- 
torem praefecit, uti eos testis suae quisque virtutis haberet. 



PROLEGOMENA. Ixxi 

Ipse a dextro cornu, quod earn partem minime firmam hostium 
esse animum adverteret, proelium commisit. Ita nostri acriter 
in liostes, signo dato, impetum fecerunt itaque hostes repente 
celeriterque procurrerunt, ut spatium pila in hostes conjiciendi 
non daretur. Rejectis pilis, comminus gladiis pugnatum 
est : at Germani, celeriter ex consuetudine sua phalange facta, 
impetus gladiorum exceperunt. Reperti sunt complures 
nostri milites, qui in phalangas insilirent et scuta manibus 
revellerent et desuper vulnerarent. Quum hostium acies a 
sinistro cornu pulsa atque in fugam conversa esset, a dextro 
cornu vehementer multitudine suorum nostram aciem preme- 
bant. Id quum animadvertisset P. Crassus adolescens, qui 
equitatu preeerat, quod expeditior erat, quam hi, qui inter 
aciem versabantur, tertiam aciem laborantibus nostris subsidio 
misit. 

LIII. Ita proelium restitutum est, atque omnes hostes 
terga verterunt, neque prius fugere destiterunt, quam ad 
flumen Rhenum millia passuum ex eo loco circiter quinqua- 
ginta pervenerunt. Ibi perpauci aut viribus confisi transnatare 
contenderunt, aut lintribus inventis sibi salutem repererunt. 
In his fuit Ariovistus, qui, naviculam deligatam ad ripam 
nactus, ea profugit : reliquos omnes consecuti equites nostri 
interfecerunt. Duse fuerunt Ariovisti uxores, una Sueva 
natione, quam ab domo secum eduxerat ; altera JNorica, regis 
Yocionis soror, quam in Gallia duxerat, a fratre missam : 
utrseque in ea fuga perierunt. Duse filise harum, altera oc- 
cisa, altera capta est. 0. Valerius Procillus, quum a custo- 
dibus in fuga trinis catenis vinctus traheretur, in ipsum 
Caesarem, hostis equitatu persequentem, incidit. Qua? quidem 
res Csesari non minorem, quam ipsa victoria, voluptatem 
adtulit, quod hominem honestissimum provincial Galliae, suum 
familiarem et hospitem, ereptum e manibus hostium, sibi 
restitutum videbat, neque ejus calamitate de tanta voluptate 
et gratulatione quidquam fortuna deminuerat. Is, se praesente, 
de se ter sortibus consultum dicebat, utrum igni statim neca- 
retur, an in aliud tempus reservaretur ; sortium beneficio se 
esse incolumem. Item M. Mettius repertus et ad eum 
reductus est. 

LIV. Hoc prcelio trans Rhenum nunciato, Suevi, qui ad 



lxxii THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

ripas Rheni venerant, domum reverti cceperunt : quos UH% 
qui proximi Rhenum incolunt, perterritos insecuti, magnum 
ex his numerum occiderimt. Caesar, una restate duobus max- 
imis bellis confeptis, maturius paullo, quam tempus anni postu- 
labat, in hiberna in Sequanos exercitum deduxit : hibernis 
Labienum praeposuit : ipse in citeriorem Galliam ad conventus 
agendos profectus est. 

I ES. BELL. GALL. II. 

IV. Quum ab his qusereret, quse civitates, quantseque 
in armis essent, et quid in bello possent, sic reperiebat : ple- 
rosque Belgas esse ortos ab Germanis ; Rhenumque antiquitus 
transductos, propter loci fertilitatem ibi consedisse, Gallosque, 
qui ea loca incolerent, expulisse ; solosque esse, qui, patrum 
nostrorum memoria, omni Gallia vexata, Teutonos Oimbrosque 
intra fines suos ingredi prohibuerint. Qua ex re fieri, uti 
earum rerum memoria magnam sibi auctoritatem magnosque 
spiritus in re militari sumerent. De numero eorum omnia 
so habere explorata, Bemi dicebant, propterea quod propin- 
quitatibus adfinitatibusque conjuncti, quantam quisque multi- 
tudinem in communi Belgarum concilio ad id bellum pollicitus 
sit, cognoverint. Plurimum inter eos Bellovacos et virtute, 
et auctoritate, et hominum numero valere : hos posse conficere 
armata millia centum : pollicitos ex eo numero electa xl., 
totiusque belli imperium sibi postulare. Suessiones suos esse 
finitimos, latissimos f'eracissimosque agros possidere. Apud 
eos fuisse regem nostra etiam memoria Divitiacum, totius 
Gallia? potentissimum, qui quum magna? partis harum regionum, 
turn etiam Britannia? imperium obtinuerit : nunc esse regem 
Gal bam : ad hunc, propter justitiam prudentiamque, totius 
belli summam omnium voluntate deferri : oppida habere 
numero xn., pollicere millia armata quinquaginta ; totidem 
Nervios, qui maxime feri inter ipsos habeantur longissimeque 
absint : xv. millia Atrebates : Ambianos x. millia : Morinos 
xxv. millia : Menapios ix. millia : Caletos x. millia : 
Velocasses et Veromanduos totidem : Aduatucos xxix. 
millia, Condrusos, Eburones, Casraesos, Pa9manos, qui uno 
nomine Germani adpettantur, arbitrari ad xl. millia. 



PROLEGOMENA. Ixxiii 

C^ES. BELL. GALL. II. 

XV. Eorum fines Nervii adtingebant : quorum de natura 
moribusque Caesar quum quasreret, sic reperiebat : " Nullum 
aditum esse ad eos mercatoribus : nihil pati vini reliqua- 
rumque rerum, ad luxuriam pertinentium, inferri, quod iis 
rebus relanguescere animos et remitti virtutem existimarent : 
esse homines feros magnseque virtutis : increpitare atque in- 
cusare reliquos Belgas, qui se populo Romano dedidissent 
patriamque virtutem projecissent : confirmare, sese neque 
legatos missuros, neque ullam conditionem pacis acceptu- 
ros.'" 

CiES. BELL. GALL. IV. 

I. Ea, qua? secuta est, hieme, qui fait annus Cn. 
Pompeio, M. Orasso Coss«, Usipetes Germani et item Tench- 
theri magna cum multitudine hominum flumen Rhenum 
transierunt, non longe a mari, quo Rhenus influit. Caussa 
transeundi fuit, quod ab Suevis. complures annos exagitati 
bello premebantur et agricultura prohibebantur. Suevorum 
gens est longe maxima et bellicosissima Germanorum omnium. 
Hi centum pagos habere dicuntur, ex quibus quotannis sin- 
gula millia armatorum bellandi caussa ex finibus educunt. 
Reliqui, qui domi manserint, se atque illos alunt. Hi rursus 
in vicem anno post in armis sunt ; illi domi remanent. Sic 
neque agricultura, nee ratio atque usus belli intermittitur. 
Sed privati ac separati agri apud eos nihil est, neque longius 
anno remanere uno in loco incolendi caussa licet. Neque 
multum frumento, sed maximam partem lacte atque pecore 
vivunt multumque sunt in venationibus : qua? res et cibi 
genere, et quotidiana exercitatione, et libertate vitse (quod, a 
pueris nullo officio aut disciplina adsuefacti, nihil omnino 
contra voluntatem faciant) et vires alit, et immani corporum 
magnitudine homines efficit. Atque in earn se consuetudinem 
adduxerunt, ut locis frigidissimis, neque vestitus, praeter pellis, 
habeant quidquam (quarum propter exiguitatem magna est 
corporis pars aperta), et laventur in fluminibus. 

II. Mercatoribus est ad eos aditus magis eo, ut, qua? bello 
ceperint, quibus vendant, habeant, quam quo ullam rem ad se 
importari desiderent : quin etiam jumentis, quibus maxime 



Lwiv TI1E GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

Gallia delectatur, quseque impenso parant pretio, Germaiii 
importatitiis non utuntur : sed qua; sunt apud eos nata, prava 
atque deformia, haec quotidiana exercitatione, summi ut sint 
laboris, effieiunt. Equestribus proeliis scepe ex equis desiliunt 
ac pedibus prceliantur ; equosque eodcm remanere vestigio 
adsuefaciunt ; ad quos se celeriter, quimi usus est, recipiunt : 
neque eorum moribus turpius quidquam aut inertius habetur, 
(jiiain ephippiis uti. Itaque ad quemvis numerum ephippia- 
torum equitum, quainvis pauci, adire audent* Vinum ad se 
omnino importari non sinunt, quod ea re ad laborem ferendurn 
remollescere homines atque effeminari arbitrantur. 

III. Publice maximam putant esse laudem, quam latis- 
sime a suis finibus vacare agros : hac re significari, magnum 
numerum civitatum suam vim sustinere non posse. Itaque 
una ex parte a Suevis circiter millia passuura dc. agri vacare 
dicuntur. Ad alteram partem succedunt Ubii (quorum fuit 
ci vitas ampla atque florens, ut est captus Germanorum), et 
paullo, quam sunt ejusdem generis, et ceteris humaniores, 
propterea quod Rhenum adtinguut multumque ad eos mer- 
catores ventitant et ipsi propter propinquitatem Gallicis sunt 
moribus adsuefacti. Hos quum Suevi, multis saepe bellis 
experti propter amplitudinem gravitatemque civitatis, finibus 
expellere non potuissent, tamen vectigales sibi fecerunt ac 
multo humiliores infirmioresque redegerunt. 

IV. In eadem caussa fuerunt Usipetes et Tenchtlieri, 
quos supra diximus, qui complures annos Suevorum vim sus- 
tiuuerunt ; ad extremum tamen agris expulsi et multis Ger- 
manise locis triennium vagati ad Rhenum pervenerunt : quas 
regiones Menapii incolebant et ad utramque ripam fluminis 
agros, a?dificia vicosque habebant ; sed tantae multitudinis aditu 
perterriti, ex his eedificiis, quae trans flurnen habuerant, demi- 
graverunt et, cis Rhenum dispositis prsesidiis, Germanos 
transire prohibebant. Illi, omnia experti, quum neque vi 
contendere propter inopiam navium, neque clam transire 
propter custodias Menapiorum possent, reverti se in suas 
sedes region esque simulaverunt : et tridui viam progressi, 
rursus reverterunt atque, omni hoc itinere una nocte equi- 
tatu confecto, inscios inopinantesque Menapios oppresserunt, 
qui, de Germanorum discessu per exploratores certiores 



PROLEGOMENA. lxxv 

facti, sine metu trans Rhenum in suos vicos remigraverant. 
His interfectis navibusque eorum occupatis, priusquam ea 
pars Menapiorum, qua? citra Rhenum quieta in suis sedibus 
erat, certior fieret, flumen transiernnt atque, omnibus eorum 
sedificiis occupatis, reliquam partem hiemis se eorum copiis 
aluerunt. 

V. His de rebus Osesar certior factus, et infirmitatem 
Gallorum veritus, quod sunt in consiliis capiendis mobiles 
et novis plerumque rebus student, nihil his committendum 
existimavit. Est autem hoc Gallicse consuetudinis, uti et 
viatores, etiam invitos, consistere cogant et, quod quisque 
eorum de quaque re audierit aut cognoverit, quserant et 
mercatores in oppidis vulgus circumsistat, quibusque ex re- 
gionibus veniant, quasque ibi res cognoverint, pronunciare 
cogant. His rumoribus atque auditionibus permoti, de 
summis saepe rebus consilia ineunt, quorum eos e vestigio 
poenitere necesse est, quum incertis rumoribus serviant et 
plerique ad voluntatem eorum ficta respondeant. 

VI. Qua consuetudine cognita, Csesar, ne graviori bello 
occurreret, maturius, quam consuerat, ad exercitum profi- 
ciscitur. Eo quum venisset, ea, quae fore suspicatus erat, 
facta cognovit, inissas legationes ab nonnullis civitatibus 
ad Germanos, invitatosque eos, uti ab Rheno discederent ; 
omniaque quae postulassent, ab se fore parata. Qua spe 
adducti Germani latius jam vagabantur et in finis Eburonum 
et Condrusorum, qui sunt Trevirorum clientes, pervenerant. 
Principibus Gallise evocatis, Csesar ea, quae cognoverat, 
dissimulanda sibi existimavit, eorumque animis permulsis et 
confirmatis equitatuque imperato, bellum cum Germanis 
gerere constituit. 

VII. Re frumentaria comparata equitibusque delectis, 
iter in ea loca facere coepit, quibus in locis esse Germanos 
audiebat. A quibus quum paucorum dierum iter abesset, 
legati ab his venerunt, quorum hsec fuit oratio : " Germanos 
neque priores populo Romano bellum inferre, neque tamen 
recusare, si lacessantur, quin armis contendant ; quod Ger- 
manorum consuetudo hsec sit a majoribus tradita, quicum- 
que bellum inferant, resistere, neque deprecari : hsec tamen 
dicere, venisse invitos, ejectos domo. Si suam gratiam 



IXXV1 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

Romani velint, posse eis utiles esse amicos : vel sibi agros 
attribuant, vel patiantur eos tenere, quos armis possederint. 
Sese unis Suevis coneedere, quibus ne dii quidem iinmor- 
tales pares esse possint : reliquum quidem iu terris esse nemi- 
nem, quern 11011 superare possint." 

VIII. Ad lirec Caesar, quse visum est, respondit ; sed exi- 
tus fuit orationis: "Sibi nullam cum his amicitiam esse posse, 
si in Gallia remanerent : neque verum esse, qui suos fines 
tueri non potuerint, alienos occupare : neque ullos in Gallia 
vacare agros, qui dari tantse prsesertim multitudini, sine 
injuria possint. Sed licere, se velint, in Ubiorum finibus 
considere, quorum sint legati apud se et de Suevorum in- 
juriis querantur et a se auxilium petant; hoc se ab iis 
inqH'tratiirum. 1 

IX. Legati hrec se ad suos relaturos dixerunt et, re 
deliberata, post diem tertium ad Csesarem reversuros: interea 
ne propius se castra moveret, petierunt. " Ne id quidem 
Caesar ab se impetrari posse "" dixit ; cognoverat enim, mag- 
uaiu partem equitatus ab iis aliquot diebus ante praedandi 
frumentandique caussa ad Ambivaritos trans Mosam missam. 
Hos exspectari equites atque ejus rei caussa moram interponi, 
arbitrabatur. 

X. Mosa profluit ex monte Vosego, qui est in finibus 
Lingonum, et, parte quadam ex Rheno recepta, quae adpel- 
Iatur Yahalis iusulamque efEcit Batavorum, in Oceanum 
influit, neque longius ab Oceano millibus passuum lxxx. 
in Rhenum transit. Rhenus autem oritur ex Lepontiis, qui 
Alpes incolunt, et longo spatio per fines Nantuatium, Helve- 
tiorum, Sequauorum, Mediomatricorum, Tribucorum, Trevi- 
rorum citatus fertur et, ubi Oceano adpropinquat, in plures 
diffluit partes, multis ingentibusque insulis efFectis, quarum 
pars magna a feris barbarisque nationibus incolitur (ex quibus 
sunt, qui piscibus atque ovis avium vivere existimantur) 
multisque capitibus in Oceanum influit. 

XI. Csesar quum ab hoste non amplius passuum xn. 
millibus abesset, ut erat constitutum, ad eum legati rever- 
tuntur : qui, in itinere congressi, magnopere, ne longius 
progrederetur, orabant. Quum id non impetrassent, pete- 
bant, uti ad eos equites, qui agmen antecessissent, praemit- 



PROLEGOMENA. Ixxvii 

teret, eosque pugna proliiberet ; sibique uti potestatem 
faceret, in Ubios legatos mittendi : quorum si principes ac 
senatus sibi jurejurando fidem fecissent, ea conditione, quse 
a Osesare ferretur, se usuros ostendebant : ad has res con- 
ficiendas sibi tridui spatium daret. Hyec omnia Csesar eodem 
illo pertinere arbitrabatnr, ut, tridui mora interposita, equites 
eorum, qui abessent, reverterentur : tamen sese non lougius 
millibus passuum quatuor aquationis caussa processurum eo 
die dixit : hue postero die quam frequentissimi convenirent, 
ut de eorum postulatis cognosceret. Interim ad prsefectos, 
qui cum omni equitatu antecesserant, mittit, qui nunciarent, 
ne hostes proelio lacesserent et, si ipsi lacesserentur, susti- 
nerent, quoad ipse cum exercitu propius accessisset. 

XII. At hostes, ubi primum nostros equites conspexe- 
runt, quorum erat quinque millium numerus, quum ipsi non 
amplius dccu. equites , haberent, quod ii, qui frumentandi 
caussa ierant trans Mosam, nondum redierant, nihil timen- 
tibus nostris, quod legati eorum paullo ante a Oaesare disces- 
serant, atque is dies induciis erat ab eis petitus, impetu facto, 
celeriter nostros perturbaverunt. Eursus resistentibus nostris, 
consuetudine sua ad pedes desiluerunt, subfossisque equis 
compluribusque nostris dejectis, reliquos in fugam conjecerunt 
atque ita perterritos egerunt, ut non prius fnga desisterent, 
quam in conspectum agminis nostri venissent. In eo proelio 
ex equitibus nostris interficiuntur quatuor et septuaginta, in 
his vir fortissimus, Piso, Aquitanus, amplissimo genere natus, 
cujus avus in civitate sua regnum obtinuerat, amicus ab 
senatu nostro adpellatus. Hie quum fratri intercluso ab 
hostibus auxilium ferret, ilium ex periculo eripuit : ipse equo 
vulnerato dejectus, quoad potuit, fortissime restitit. Quum 
circumventus, multis vulneribus acceptis, cecidisset, atque id 
frater, qui jam proelio excesserat, procul animum advertisset, 
incitato equo se hostibus obtulit atque interfectus est. 

XIII. Hoc facto proelio, Caesar neque jam sibi legatos 
audiendos, neque conditiones accipiendas arbitrabatur ab his, 
qui per dolum atque insidias, petita pace, ultro bellum intulis- 
sent : exspectare vero, dum hostium copise augerentur equita- 
tusque reverteretur, summse dementia? esse judicabat et, cognita 
Gallorum infirmitate, quantum jam apud eos hostes uno prce- 



lxxviii THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

lio auctoritatis essent consecuti, sentiebat : quibus ad consilia 
capienda nihil spatii dandum existimabat. His constitutis 
rebus et consilio cum legatis et qusestore communicate, ue 
quern diem pugnse praetermitteret, opportunissima res accidit, 
quod postridie (.'jus diei mane eadem et perfidia et simulations 
usi Grermani, frequentes, omnibus principibus majoribusque 
natu adhibitis, ad eum in castra venerunt; simul, ut dice- 
batur, sui purgandi caussa, quod contra, atque esset dictum et 
ipsi petissent, prcclium pridie commisissent ; simul ut, si quid 
possent, de induciis falleudo impetrarent. Quos sibi Caesar 
oblatos gavisus, illos retineri jussit ; ipse omnes copias castris 
eduxit, equitatumque, quod recenti prcolio perterritum esse 
existimabat, agmen subsequi jussit. 

XIV. Acie triplici instituta, et celeriter vin. millium 
itinere confecto, prius ad hostium castra perveuit, quam*, quid 
ageretur, Grermani sentire possent. Qui, omnibus rebus 
subito perterriti, et celeritate adventus nostri, et discessu 
suorum, neque consilii habendi, neque anna capiendi spatio 
dato, perturbantur, copiasne adversus hostem educere, an 
castra defendere, an fuga saiutem petcre, prsestaret. Quorum 
timor quura fremitu et concursu significaretur, milites nostri, 
pristini diei perfidia incitati, in castra irruperunt. Quorum 
qui celeriter anna capere potuerunt, panllisper nostris restite- 
runt atque inter carros impedimentaque prceliuni commise- 
runt : at reliqua multitudo puerorum mulierumque (nam cum 
omnibus suis domo excesserant Rhenumque transierant) pas- 
sim fugere coepit ; ad quos consectandos Caesar equitatum 
misit. 

XV. Germani, post tergum clamore audito, quum suos 
interfici viderent, armis abjectis signisque militaribus relictis, 
se ex castris ejecerunt : et, quum ad confluentem Moste et 
Rlieni pervenissent, reliqua fuga desperata, magno numero 
interfecto, reliqui se in flumen prsecipitaverunt atque ibi 
timore, lassitudine, vi fluminis oppressi perierunt. Nostri ad 
unum omnes incolumes, perpaucis vulneratis, ex tanti belli 
timore, quum hostium numerus capitum ccccxxx. millium 
fuisset, se in castra receperunt. Caesar his, quos in castris 
retinuerat, discedendi potestatem fecit : illi supplicia crucia- 
tusque Gallorum veriti, quorum agros vexaverant, remanere 



PROLEGOMENA- lxxix 

se apud eum velle dixerunt. His Caesar libertatem con- 
cessit. 

XVI. Germanieo bello confecto, inultis de caussis Csesar 
statuit, sibi Rhenum esse transeundum : quarum ilia fait 
justissima, quod, quum videret, Germanos tarn facile impelli, 
ut in Galliam venirent, suis quoque rebus eos timere voluit, 
quum intelligerent, et posse et audere populi Romani exerci- 
tuni Rhenum transire. Accessit etiam, quod ilia pars equi- 
tatus Usipetum et Tenchtherorum, quam supra commemoravi 
prsedandi frumentandique caussa Mosam transisse, neque 
proelio interfuisse, post fugam suorum se trans Rhenum in 
fines Sigambrorum receperat neque cum hs conjunxerat. Ad 
quos quum Caesar nuncios misisset, qui postularent, eos, qui 
sibi Galliseque bellum intulissent, sibi dederent, responderunt : 
" Populi Romani imperium Rhenum finire : si, se invito Ger- 
manos in Galliam transire, non sequum existimaret, cur sui 
quidquam esse imperii aut potestatis trans Rhenum postu- 
laret V Ubii autem, qui uni ex transrhenanis ad Osesarem 
legatos miserant, amicitiam fecerant, obsides dederant, magno- 
pere orabant, " ut sibi auxilium ferret, quod graviter ab Suevis 
premerentur ; vel, si id facere occupationibus reipublicse 
prohiberetur, exercitum modo Rhenum transportaret : id sibi 
ad auxilium spemqne reliqui temporis satis futurum : tantum 
esse nomen atque opinionem ejus exercitus, Ariovisto pulso et 
hoc novissimo prcelio facto, etiam ad ultimas Germanorum 
nationes, uti opinione et amicitia populi Romani tuti esse 
possint. r ' Navium magnam copiam ad transportandum exer- 
citum pollicebantur. 

XVII. Csesar his de caussis, quas commemoravi, Rhe- 
num transire decreverat ; sed navibus transire, neque satis 
tutum esse arbitrabatur, neque sua? neque populi Romani 
dignitatis esse statuebat. Itaque, etsi summa difficultas 
faciundi pontis proponebatur propter latitudinem, rapiditatem 
altitudinemque fluminis, tamen id sibi contendendum, aut 
aliter non transducendum exercitum, existimabat. Rationem 
pontis hanc instituit. Tigna bina sesquipedalia, paullum ab 
imo prseacuta, dimensa ad altitudinem fluminis, intervallo 
pedum duorum inter se jungebat. Hsec quum machinatio- 
nibus immissa in flumen defixerat fistucisque adegerat, non 



IXXX THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

sublica? niodo derecta ad perpendiculum, sod prona ac fasti- 
gata, ut secundum naturam flumiuis procumberent : iis item 
contraria duo, ad eumdem modum juncta, intervallo pedum 
quadragenum, ab inferiore parte, contra vim atque impetum 
fluminis conversa statuebat. Haec utraque insuper bipeda- 
libus trabibus immissis, quantum eorum tignorum junctura 
distabat, binis utriumque fibulis ab extrema parte, distine- 
bantur : quibus disclusis atque in contrariam partem revinctis, 
tanta erat operis firmitudo atque ea rerum natura, ut, quo 
major vis aqua? se incitavisset, hoc artius illigata tenerentur. 
H»c derecta materie injecta contexebantur et longuriis crati- 
busque consternebantur ; ac nihilo secius sublica? et ad infcri- 
orem partem fluminis oblique agebantur, qua?, pro pariete 
subjects? et cum omni opere conjuncta\ vim fluminis excipe- 
rent : et alia? item supra pontem mediocri spatio, ut, si 
arborum trunci sive naves dejiciendi operis essent a barbaris 
missse, his defensoribus earum rerum vis minueretur, neu 
ponti nocerent. 

XVIII. Diebus decern, quibus materia ccepta erat com- 
portari, omni opere effecto, exercitus transducitur. Ca?sar, 
ad utramque partem pontis firmo pra?sidio relicto, in fines 
Sigambrorum contendit. Interim a compluribus civitatibus 
ad eum legati veniunt, quibus pacem atque amicitiam peten- 
tibus liberaliter respondit obsidesque ad se adduci jubet. At 
Sigambri ex eo tempore, quo pons institui coeptus est, fuga 
comparata, hortantibus iis, quos ex Tenchtheris atque Usipe- 
tibus apud se habebant, finibus suis excesserant, suaque 
omnia exportaverant, seque in solitudinem ac silvas abdi- 
derant. 

XIX. Csesar, paucos dies in eorum finibus moratus, 
omnibus vicis sedificiisque incensis frumentisque succisis, se 
in fines Ubiorum recepit ; atque iis auxilium sumn pollicitus, 
si ab Suevis premerentur, heec ab iis cognovit : Suevos, post- 
eaquam per exploratores pontem fieri comperissent, more suo 
concilio habito, nuncios in omnes partes dimisisse, uti de 
oppidis demigrarent, liberos, uxores, suaque omnia in silvas 
deponerent atque omnes, qui arma ferre possent, unum in 
locum convenirent : hunc esse delectum medium fere re- 
gionum earum, quas Suevi obtinerent : hie Romanorum 



PROLEGOMENA. Ixxxi 

aclventum exspectare atque ibi clecertare constituisse. Quod 
ubi Oseisar comperlt, omnibus his rebus confectis, quaruni 
rerum caussa transducere exercitum constituerat, ut Ger- 
manis metum injiceret, ut Sigambros ulcisceretur, ut Ubios 
obsidione liberaret, diebus omnino x. et vm. trans Rhenum 
consumtis, satis et ad laudem et ad utilitatem profectum 
arbitratus, se in Galliani recepit pontemque rescidit. 

CMS. BELL. GALL. VI. 

IX. Csesar, postquam ex Menapiis in Treviros venit, 
duabus de caussis Rhenum transire constituit : quaruni erat 
altera, quod auxilia contra se Treviris miserant ; altera, ne 
Ambiorix ad eos receptum haberet. His constitutis rebus, 
paullum supra eum locum, quo ante exercitum transduxerat, 
facere pontem instituit. Nota atque instituta ratione, magno 
militum studio, paucis diebus opus efficitur. Firmo in Tre- 
viris preesidio ad pontem relicto, ne quis ab iis subito motus 
oriretur, reliquas copias equitatumque transducit. Ubii, qui 
ante obsides dederant atque in deditionem venerant, purgandi 
sui caussa ad eum legatos mittunt, qui doceant, " neque ex 
sua civitate auxilia in Treviros missa, neque ab se fidem 
Isesam :" petunt atque orant, " ut sibi parcat, ne communi 
odio Gernianorum innocentes pro nocentibus poenas pendant :" 
si amplius obsidum velit, dare pollicentur. Cognita Ceesar 
caussa reperit, ab Suevis auxilia missa esse, Ubiorum satis- 
factionem accepit, aditus viasque in Suevos perquirit. 

X. Interim paucis post diebus fit ab Ubiis certior, 
Suevos omnes unum in locum copias cogere atque iis na- 
tionibus, quae sub eornm sint imperio, denunciare, uti auxilia 
peditatus equitatusque mittant. His cognitis rebus, rem 
frumentariam providet, castris idoneum locum deligit, Ubiis 
imperat, ut pecora deducant suaque omnia ex agris in oppida 
conferant, sperans, barbaros atque imperitos homines, inopia 
cibariorum adductos, ad iniquam pugnandi conclitionem posse 
deduci : mandat, ut crebros exploratores in Suevos mittant, 
quaeque apud eos gerantur, cognoscant. Illi imperata faciunt 
et paucis diebus intermissis referunt, " Suevos omnes, post- 
eaquam certiores nuncii de exercitu Romanorum venerint, cum 
omnibus suis sociorumque copiis, quas coegissent, penitus ad 

9 



lxxxii THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

extremos fines sese recepisse : silvam esse ibi infinita magnitu- 
dine, quae adpellatur Bacenis, hanc longe introrsus pertinere et, 
pro nativo muro objectam, Cheruscos ab Suevis, Suevosque ab 
Gheruscis, iiijuriis incursionibusque prohibcre : ad ejus initium 
silvee Suevos adventum Romanorum exspectare constituisse." 

XI. Quoniam ad liune locum perventum est, non alienuni 
esse videtur, de Galliae Germaniaeque moribus, et quo dif- 
ferant hx nationes inter sese, proponere. In Gallia non 
solum in omnibus civitatibus atque in omnibus pagis par- 
tibusque, sed psene etiam in singulis domibus factiones sunt : 
earumque factionum principes sunt, qui summam auctorita- 
fcem eorumjudicio habere existimantur, quorum ad arbitrium 
judiciumque summa omnium rerum consiliorumque redeat. 
Idque ejus rci caussa antiqnitus institutum videtur, ne quis 
ex plebe contra potentiorem auxilii egeret : suos cnimquisque 
opprimi et circumveniri non patitur, neque, aliter si faciant, 
ullaiii inter suos habent auctoritatem. Hacc eadem ratio est 
in summa totius Gallia; : namque omnes civitates in partes 
divisse sunt duas. 

XII. Quum Caesar in Galliam venit, alterius factionis 
principes erant iEdui, alterius Sequani. Hi quum per se 
minus valerent, quod summa auctoritas antiquitus erat 
in ^Eduis, magnacque eorum erant clientela3. Germanos 
atque Ariovistum sibi adjunxerant eosque ad se magnie 
jacturis pollicitationibusque perduxerant. Prceliis vero com- 
pluribns factis secundis, atque omni nobilitate vEduorum 
interfecta, tantum potentia antecesserant, ut magnam partem 
clientium ab iEduis ad se transducerent obsidesque ab iis 
principum filios acciperent et publice jurare cogerent, nihil 
se contra Sequanos consilii inituros ; et partem finitimi agri, 
per vim occupatam, possiderent Galliseque totius principatum 
obtinerent. Qua necessitate adductus Divitiacus, auxilii 
petendi caussa Romam ad senatum profectus, infecta re 
redierat. Adventu Caesaris facta commutatione rerum, obsi- 
dibus iEduis redditis, veteribus clientelis restitutis, novis 
per Caasarem comparatis (quod hi, qui se ad eorum ami- 
citiam adgregaverant, meliore conditione atque aequiore im- 
perio se uti videbant), reliquis rebus eorum, gratia, dignitate 
amplificata, Sequani principatum dimiserant. In eorum 



PROLEGOMENA. Ixxxiii 

locum Remi successerant ; quos quod adsequare apud Ca> 
sarem gratia intelligebatur, ii, qui propter veteres inimicitias 
nullo modo cum iEduis conjungi poterant, se Remis in cli- 
entelam dicabant. Hos illi diligenter tuebantur. Ita et 
novam et repente collectam auctoritatem tenebant. Eo turn 
statu res erat, ut longe principes baberentur iEdui, secundum 
locum dignitatis Remi obtinerent. 

XIII. In omni Gallia eorum hominum, qui aliquo sunt 
numero atque honore, genera sunt duo : nam plebes paene 
servorum habetur loco, quae per se nihil audet et nullo 
adhibetur consilio. Plerique, quum aut aere alieno, aut 
magnitudine tributorum, aut injuria potentiorum prementur, 
sese in servitutem dicant nobilibus, in hos eadem omnia sunt 
jura, qua? dominis in servos. Sed de his duobus generibus 
alterum est Druidum, alterum equitum. Illi rebus divinis 
intersunt, sacrificia publica ac privata procurant, religiones 
interpretantur. Ad hos magnus adolescentium numerus 
discipline caussa concurrit, magnoque ii sunt apud eos 
honore. Nam fere de omnibus controversiis publicis pri- 
vatisque constituunt ; et, si quod est admissum facinus, si 
csedes facta, si de hsereditate, si de finibus controversia est, 
iidem decernunt ; praemia pcenasque constituunt : si qui aut 
privatus aut publicus eorum decreto non stetit, sacrificiis 
interdicunt. Haec pcena apud eos est gravissima. Quibus 
ita est interdictum, ii numero impiorum ac sceleratorum 
habentur ; iis omnes decedunt, aditum eorum sermonemque 
defugiunt, ne quid ex contagione incommodi accipiant : neque 
iis petentibus jus redditur, neque honos ullus communicatur. 
His autem omnibus Druidibus praeest unus, qui summam 
inter eos habet auctoritatem. Hoc mortuo, si qui ex reliquis 
excellit dignitate succedit : at, si sunt plures pares, suffragio 
Druidum adlegitur, nonnumquam etiam armis de principatu 
contendunt. Hi certo anni tempore in finibus Carnutnm, 
quas regio totius Galliae media habetur, considunt in loco 
consecrato. Hue omnes undique, qui controversias habent, 
conveniunt eorumque decretis jucliciisque parent. Disciplina 
in Britannia reperta atque inde in Galliam translata esse 
existimatur : et nunc, qui diligentius earn rem cognoscere 
volunt, plerumque illo discendi caussa proficiscuntur. 

9 2 



Ixxxiv THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

XIV. Druides a bello abessc consuerunt, nequc tributa 
una cum reliquis pendunt ; militia; vacationem omniumque 
rerum habeat immunitatem. Tantis excitati prsemiis, et 
sua gponte multi in disciplinam conveniunt, et a parentibus 
propinquisque mittuntur. Magnum ibi numorum versuum 
ediscere dicuntur: itaque annos nonnulli vicenos in disciplina 
permanent. Neque fas esse existimant, ca litteris mandare, 
(liiuni in reliquis fere rebus, publicis privatisque rationibus, 
Graecis utantur litteris. Id milii duabus de caussis instituissc 
videntur ; quod neque in vulguin disciplinam efferri velint, 
neque eos, qui discant, litteris confisos, minus memorise 
studere; quod fere plerisque accidit, ut prsesidio litterarum 
diligentiam in perdiscendo ac memoriam remittant. In 
primis hoc volunt persuadere, non interire aninias, sed ab 
aliis post mortem transire ad alios: atque hoc maxime ad 
virtutem excitari putant, metu mortis neglecto. Multa prse- 
terea de sidcribus atque eorum motu, de mundi ac terrarum 
magnitudine, de rerum natnra, de deorum immortalium vi ac 
potestate disputant et juventuti transdant. 

XV. Alteram genus est equitum. Hi, quum est usus, 
atque aliquod bellum incidit (quod ante Osesaris adventum 
fere quotannis accidere solebat, uti aut ipsi injurias inferrent, 
aut illatas propulsarent), omnes in bello versantur : atque 
eorum ut quisque est genere copiisque amplissimus, ita plurimos 
circum se ambactos clientesque habent. Hanc unam gratiam 
potentiamque noverunt. 

XVI. Natio est omnis Gallorum admodum dedita reli- 
gionibus ; atque ob earn caussam, qui sunt adfecti gravioribus 
morbis, quique in proeliis periculisque versantur, aut pro 
victimis homines immolant, aut se immolaturos vovent ad- 
ministrisque ad ea sacrificia Druidibus utuntur ; quod, pro 
vita hominis nisi hominis vita reddatur, non posse aliter 
deorum immortalium numen placari arbitrantur : publiceque 
ejusdem generis habent instituta sacrificia. Alii immani 
magnitudine simulacra habent, quorum contexta viminibus 
membra vivis hominibus complent, quibus succensi,s, circum- 
venti flamma exanimantur homines. Supplicia eorum, qui 
in furto, aut in latrocinio, aut aliqua noxa sint comprehensi, 
gratiora diis immortalibus esse arbitrantur ; sed, quum ejus 



PROLEGOMENA. LxXXV 

generis copia deficit, etiam ad innocentium supplicia descen- 
dant. 

XVII. Deuni niaxime Mercurium colunt : hnjus sunt 
plurima simulacra, hunc omnium inventorem artium ferunt, 
hunc viarum atque itinerum ducem, hunc ad qusestus pecunias 
mercaturasque habere vim maximam arbitrantur. Post hunc, 
Apollinem et Martem et Jovem et Minervam : de hiseamdem 
fere, quam reliquse gentes, habent opinionem ; Apollinem 
morbos depellere, Minervam operum atque artificiorum initia 
transdere ; Jovem imperium cselestiuin tenere ; Martem bella 
regere. Huic, quum proelio dimicare constituerunt, ea, quse 
bello ceperint, plerumque devovent. Quse superaverint, ani- 
malia capta immolant ; reliquas res in unum locum conferunt. 
Multis in civitatibus harum rerum exstructos tumulos locis 
consecratis conspicari licet : neque ssepe accidit, ut, neglecta 
quispiam religione, aut capta apud se occultare, aut posita 
tollere auderet ; gravissimumque ei rei supplicium cum cru- 
ciatu constitutum est. 

XVIII. Galli se omnes ab Dite patre prognatos pree- 
dicant, idque ab Druidibus proditum dicunt. Ob earn caussam 
spatia omnis temporis non numero dierum, sed noctium 
finiunt ; dies natales et mensium et annorum initia sic ob- 
servant, ut noctem dies subsequatur. In reliquis vitse insti- 
tutis hoc fere ab reliquis different, quod suos liberos, nisi 
quum adoleverint, ut munus militias sustinere possint, palam 
ad se adire non patiuntur, filiumque puerili eetate in publico, 
in conspectu patris, adsistere, turpe ducunt. 

XIX. Viri, quantas pecunias ab uxoribus dotis nomine 
acceperunt, tantas ex suis bonis, Bestimatione facta, cum 
dotibus communicant. Hujus omnis pecunise conjunctim 
ratio habetur, fructusque servantur : uter eorum vita superarit, 
ad eum pars utriusque cum fructibus superiorum temporum 
pervenit. Viri in uxores, sicuti in liberos, vitse necisque 
habent potestatem : et, quum pater familise, illustriore loco 
natus, decessit, ejus propinqui conveniunt et, de morte si res 
in suspicionem venit, de uxoribus in servilem modum quse- 
stionem habent et, si compertum est, igni atque omnibus 
tormentis excrutiatas interficiunt. Funera sunt pro cultu 
Gallorum magnifica et sumptuosa ; omniaque, qua? vivis cordi 



Ixxxvi THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

fuisse arbitrantur, in ignem inferunt, etiam animalia; ac paullo 
supra hanc memoriam servi et clientes, quos ab iis dilectos 
esse constabat, justis funeribus confectis, una cremabantur. 

XX. Qua} eivitates commodius suam rem publicam admi- 
nistrare existimantur, habent legibus sanctum, si quis quid 
de re publica a finitimis rumore ac fama acceperit, uti ad 
magistratum deferat, neve cum quo alio communicet : quod 
saepe homines temerarios atque imperitos falsis rumoribus 
terreri et ad facinus impelli et de summis rebus consilium 
capere cognitum est. Magistratus, qua? visa sunt, occultant ; 
quseque esse ex usn judicaverint, multitudini produnt. De re 
publica nisi per concilium loqui non conceditur. 

XXT. Grermani multum ab hac consuetudine differunt : 
nam neque Druides habent, qui rebus divinis prresint, neque 
sacrificiis student. Deorum numero eos solos ducunt, quos 
cernunt et quorum aperte opibus juvantur, Solem et Vulcanum 
et Lunam : reliquos ne fama quidem acceperunt. Vita omnis 
in venationibus atque in studiis rei militaris consistit : ab 
parvulis labori ac duritise student. Qui diutissime impuberes 
permanserunt, maximam inter suos ferunt laudem : hoc ali 
statu rain, ali hoc vires nervosque confirmari putant. Intra 
annum vero vicesimum feminse notitiam habuisse, in turpissimis 
habent rebus ; cujus rei nulla est occultatio, quod et promiscue 
in fluminibus perluuntur, et pellibus aut parvis rhenonum 
tegimentis utuntur, magna corporis parte nuda. 

XXII. Agricultural non student; majorque pars victus 
eorum in lacte, caseo, carne consistit : neque quisquam agri 
modum certum aut fines habet proprios : sed magistratus ac 
principes in annos singnlos gentibus cognationibusque homi- 
num, qui una coierint, quantum, et quo loco visum est, agri 
adtribuunt atque anno post alio transire cogunt. Ejus rei 
multas adferunt caussas ; ne, adsidua consuetudine capti, 
studium belli gerundi agricultura commutent ; ne latos fines 
parare studeant potentioresque humiliores possessionibus ex- 
pellant ; ne adcuratius ad frigora atque sestus vitandos 
sedificent ; ne qua oriatur pecuniae cupiditas, qua ex re 
factiones dissensionesque nascuntur ; ut animi sequitate ple- 
bem contineant, quum suas quisque opes cum potentissimis 
sequari videat. 



PROLEGOMENA. Ixxxvii 

XXIII. Civitatibus maxima lans est, quam latissimas 
circum se vastatis finibus solituclines babere. Hoc propvium 
virtutis existimant, expulsos agris finitimos cedere, neque 
quern quam prope audere consistere : simul hoc se fore tutiores 
arbitrantur, repentinss incursionis timore sublato. Quum 
bellum civitas aut illatum defendit, aut infert : magistrates, 
qui ei bello prsesint, ut vitse necisque habeant potestatem, 
deliguntur. In pace nullus est communis magistratus, sed 
principes regionum atque pagorum inter suos jus dicunt, 
controversiasque minuunt. Latrocinia nullam habent infami- 
am, qua? extra fines cujusque civitatis fiunt ; atque ea jn Ven- 
turis exercendse ac desidise minuendse caussa fieri prsedicant. 
Atque, ubi quis ex principibus in concilio dixit, " se ducem 
fore ; qui sequi velint, profiteantur,' 1 consurgunt ii, qui et 
caussam et liominem probant, suumque auxilium pollicentur 
atque ab multitudine collaudantur : qui ex iis secuti non 
sunt, in desertorum ac proditorum numero ducuntur omni- 
umque iis rerum postea fides derogatur. Hospites violare, fas 
non putant ; qui quaque de caussa ad eos venerint, ab injuria 
prohibent sanctosque habent ; iis omnium domus patent, 
victusque communicatur. 

XXIV. Ac fuit antea tempus, quum Germanos Galli 
virtute superarent, ultro bella inferrent, propter hominum 
multitudinem agrique inopiam trans Ehenum colonias mitte- 
rent. Itaque ea, quae fertilissima sunt, Germanise loca circum 
Hercyniam silvam (quam Eratostheni et quibusclam Graecis 
fama notam esse video, quam illi Orcyniam adpellant), Volcas 
Tectosages occupaverunt atque ibi consederunt. Quae gens 
ad hoc tempus iis sedibus sese continet summamque habet 
justitise et bellicse laudis opinionem : nunc quoque in eadem 
inopia, egestate, patientia, qua Germani, permanent eodem 
victu et cultu corporis utuntur ; Gallis autem provincise 
propinquitas, et transmarinarum rerum notitia, multa ad 
copiam atque usus largitur. Paullatim adsuefacti superari, 
multisque victi proeliis, ne se quidem ipsi cum illis virtute 
comparant. 

XXV. Hujus Hercynise silvse, qua? supra demonstrata 
est, latitudo novem dierum iter expedito patet : non enim 
aliter finiri potest, neque mensuras itinerum noverunt. Oritur 



Ixxxviii THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

ab Helvetiorum et Nemetum et Rauracorum finibus, rectaque 
fluminis Danubii regions pertinet ad fines Dacorum et 
Anartium : hinc se flectit sinistrorsus, diversis ab flumine 
regionibus, multarumque gentium fines propter magnitudinem 
adtingit ; neque quisquam est hujus Germanise, qui se aut 
adisse ad initium ejus silvae dicat, quum dierum iter lx. pro- 
cesserit, aut quo ex loco oriatur, acceperit. Multa in ea 
genera ferarum nasci constat, qua3 reliquis in locis visa non 
sint : ex quibus quse maxime difterant ab ceteris et memorise 
prodenda videautur, hsec sunt. 

XXYI. Est bos cervi figura, cujus a media fronte inter 
aures unum cornu exsistit, excelsius magisque directum his, 
quse nobis nota sunt, cornibus. Ab ejus summo, sicut palmse, 
rami quam late diffunduntur. Eadem est feminre marisque 
natura, eadem forma magnitudoque cornuum. 

XXVII. Sunt item, quae adpellautur alces. Harum 
est consimilis capreis figura et varietas pellium ; sed mag- 
nitudine paullo antecedunt mutilseque sunt cornibus et crura 
sine nodis articulisque habent ; neque quietis caussa procum- 
bunt, neque, si quo adflictse casu conciderint, erigere sese aut 
sublevare possunt. His sunt arbores pro cubilibus : ad eas 
se adplicant, atque ita, paullum modo reclinatse, quietem 
capiunt : quarum ex vestigiis quum est animadversum a 
venatoribus, quo se recipere consuerint, omnes eo loco aut ab 
radicibus subruunt, aut accidunt arbores tantum, ut summa 
species earum stantium relinquatur. Hue quum se consue- 
tudine reelinaverint, infirmas arbores pondere adfligunt atque 
una ipsse concidunt. 

XXVIII. Tertium est genus eorum, qui uri adpellantur. 
Hi sunt magnitudine paullo infra elephantos ; specie et colore 
et figura tauri. Magna vis eorum et magna velocitas : 
neque homini, neque ferse, quam conspexerint, parcunt. Hos 
studiose foveis captos interficiunt. Hoc se labore durant 
homines adolescentes atque hoc genere venationis exercent ; 
et, qui plurimos ex his interfecerunt, relatis in publicum 
cornibus, quse sint testimonio, magnam ferunt laudem. Sed 
adsuescere ad homines et mansuefieri, ne parvuli quidem 
excepti, possunt. Amplitudo cornuum et figura et species 
multum a nostrorum bourn cornibus differt. Hsec studiose 



PROLEGOMENA. lxxxix 

conquisita ab labris argento circumcludunt atque in amplissi- 
mis epulis pro poculis utuntur. 



$> XX. ARMINIUS AND MAROBODUUS. 

After Ariovistus in point of time, but before him in promi- 
nence and importance, come the two great Germans, Armi- 
nius and Maroboduus ; concerning whom the chief texts 
are from Velleius Paterculus and Tacitus himself. I shall 
append to these Niebuhr's account of the same events, as it 
stands in Dr. Schmitz's edition of his Lectures, such being 
the best way to compare the evidence in its crude and its 
systematized form. The criticism upon the whole will be 
found in the body of the work. 

VELL. PATERC. II. 

CVIII. Nihil erat jam in Germania, quod vinci posset, 
prater gentem Marcomannorum ; quse, Maroboduo duce 
excita sedibus suis, atque in interiora refugiens, incinctos 
Hercynia silva campos incolebat. Nulla festinatio hujus viri 
mentionem transgredi debet. Maroboduus, genere nobilis, 
corpore praevalens, animo ferox, natione magis quam ratione 
barbarus, non tumultuarium, neque fortuitum, neque mobilem 
et ex voluntate parentium constantem inter suos occupavit 
principatum ; seel, certum imperium vimque regiam com- 
plexus animo, statuit, avocata procul a liomanis gente sua, eo 
progredi, ubi, cum propter potentiora arma refugisset, sua 
faceret potentissima. 

CIX. Occupatis igitur, quos prsediximus, locis, flnitimos 
omnes aut bello domuit, aut conditionibus juris sui fecit : 
corpus suum custodia munivit : imperium, perpetuis armorum 
exercitiis (exercitu) psene ad Romanee discipline formam 
redacto, brevi in eminens et nostro quoque imperio timendum 
perduxit fastigium ; gerebatque se ita adversus Romanos, 
ut neque bello nos lacesseret, et, si lacesseretur, super- 
esse sibi vim ac voluntatem resistendi (ostenderet). Le- 
gati, quos mittebat ad Osesares, interdum ut supplicem 
commendabant, interdum ut pro pari loquebantur. Gen- 
tibus hominibusque a nobis desciscentibus erat apud eum 



XC THE GERMxVNY OF TACITUS. 

perfngium ; totusqne ex male dissimulate- agebat aemulum ; 
exercitumque, quern lxx. millium peditum, quatuor equi- 
tum, fecerat, assiduis adversus finitimos bellis exercendo, 
majori, quam quod habebat, operi preeparabat. Eratque 
etiam eo timendus, quod, cum Germaniam ad Irevam et in 
f route, Panuoniam ad dextram, a tergo sedium suarum habe- 
ret Noricos, tamquam in omnes semper venturus, ab omni- 
bus timebatur. Nee securam increment! sui patiebatur esse 
Italiam : quippe cum a su minis Alpium jugis, quaa finem 
Italice terminant, initium ejus finium baud multo plus cc. 
millibus passuum abesset. Hunc virum et banc regionem 
proximo anno diversis e partibus Tib. Caesar aggredi statuit. 
Sentio Saturnino mandatum, ut per Oattos, excisis continen- 
tibus Hercynia) silvis, legiones Boiobannum (id regioni, quam 
incolebat Maroboduus, nomen est) duceret ; ipse a Carnunto, 
qui locus Norici regni proximus ab liac parte erat, exercitum, 
qui in Illyrico mcrebat, ducere in Marcomaunos orsus est. 

VELL. PATERC. II. 

CX VII. Tantum quod ultimam imposuerat Pannonico ac 
Delmatico bello Cresar manum, cum, intra quinque con- 
summati tanti operis dies, funestse ex Germania epistolee, 
caesi Vari, trucidatarumque legionum trium totidemque alarum, 
et sex cohortium : velut in hoc saltern tantummodo indul- 
gente nobis Fortuna, ne occupato duce. Sed causa et per- 
sona moram exigit. Varus Quinctilius, nobili magis, quam 
illustri ortus familia, vir ingenio mitis, moribus quietus, ut 
corpore, ita animo immobilior, otio magis castrorum, quam 
bellicse assuetus militise : pecunise vero quam non contemtor, 
Syria, cui praefuerat, declaravit ; quam pauper divitem ingres- 
sus, dives pauperem reliquit. Is cum exercitui, qui erat in 
Germania, prseesset, concepit esse homines, qui nihil prseter vo- 
cem membraque haberent hominum ; quique gladiis domari non 
poterant, posse jure mulceri. Quo proposito mediam ingres- 
sus Germaniam, velut inter viros pacis gaudentes dulcedine, ju- 
risdictionibus, agendoque pro tribunali ordine, trahebat sestiva. 

CXVIII. At illi, quod nisi expertus vix credat, in summa 
feritate versutissimi, natumque mendacio genus, simulantes 
fictas litium series, et nunc provocantes alter alterum inju- 



PROLEGOMENA. Xci 

ria, nunc agentes gratias, quod ea Romana justitia finiret, 
feritasque sua novitate incognita? disciplinse mitesceret, et 
solita arniis descerni jure terminarentur, in summam socordiam 
perduxere Quinctilium ; usque eo, ut se prsetoreni urbanum 
in foro jus dicere, non in mediis Germanise finibus exercitui 
prseesse crederet. Turn juvenis genere nobilis, manu fortis, 
sensu celer, ultra barbarum promtus ingenio, nomine Arminius, 
Sigimeri principis gentis ejus filius, ardorem animi vultu 
oculisque praaferens, assiduus militice nostras prioris comes, 
(cum) jure etiam civitates Rornanse jus equestris consequens 
gradus, segnitia ducis in occasionem sceleris usus est, haud 
imprudenter speculatus, neminem celerius opprimi, quam qui 
nihil timeret ; et frequentissimum initium esse calamitatis, 
securitatem. Primo igitur paucos, mox plures in socie- 
tatem consilii recipit : opprimi posse Romanos, et dicit, et 
persuadet ; decretis facta jungit ; tempus insidiarum consti- 
tuit. Id Varo per virum ejus gentis fidelem clarique no- 
minis Segesten indicatur. Sed obstabant jam fata consiliis, 
omnemque animi ejus aciem prsestrinxerant. Quippe ita se 
res habet, ut plerumque [qui] fortunam mutaturus Deus, con- 
silia corrumpat, efficiatque, quod miserrimum est, ut, quod 
accidit, id etiam merito accidisse videatur, et casus in culpam 
transeat. Negat itaque se credere, spemque in se bene- 
volentiee ex merito sestimare profitetur. Nee diutius, post 
primum indicem, secundo relictus locus. 

CXIX. Ordinem atrocissimse calamitatis, qua nulla, post 
Orassi in Parthis damnum, in externis gentibus gravior Ro- 
manis fuit, justis voluminibus, ut alii, ita nos conabimur 
exponere. Nunc summa deflenda est. Exercitus omnium 
fortissimus, disciplina, manu, experientiaque bellorum inter 
Romanos milites princeps, marcore ducis, perfidia hostis, 
iniquitate fortunse circumventus (cum ne pugnandi quidem 
aut egrediendi occasio iis, in quantum voluerant, data esset 
impune ; castigatis etiam quibusdam gravi pcena, quia Ro- 
manis et armis et animis usi fuissent), inclusus silvis, palu- 
dibus, insidiis, ab eo hoste ad internecionem trucidatus est, 
quern semper ita more pecudum trucidaverat, ut vitam aut 
mortem ejus nunc ira, nunc venia temperaret. Duci plus 
ad moriendumj quam ad pugnandum, animi fuit. Quippe 



XCli THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

paterni avitique exempli successor se ipse transfixit. At 
e praefectis castrorum duobus, quam clarum exemplum L. 
Eggius, tarn turpe (C.) Ceionius prodidit : qui, cum longe 
maximam partem absumsisset acies, auctor deditionis, sup- 
plicio quam proelio mori maluit. At Vala Numouius, 
legatus Vari, cetera quietus ac pro-bus, cliri auctor exempli, 
spoliatum equite peditem reliuquens, fuga cum alis Rheuum 
petere ingressus est. Quod factum ejus fortuna ulta est : 
non enim desertis superfuit, sed desertor occidit. Vari 
corpus semiustum hostilis laceraverat feritas ; caput ejus 
abscissum, latumque ad Maroboduum, et ab eo missum ad 
Csesarem, gentilitii taudem tumuli sepultura honoratum est. 

CXX. His auditis revolat ad patrem Caesar ; perpetuus 
patronus Romani imperii, assuetam sibi causam suscipit. 
JNIittitur ad Germaniam, Gallias confirmat, disponit exercitus, 
praesidia munit ; se magnitudine sua, non fiducia (ducis) 
motions, qui Cimbricam Teutonicamque militiam Italia) mina- 
batur, ultro Rhenum cum exercitu transgreditur. Anna 
infert genti, quam arcuisse pater et patria contenti erant ; 
penetrat interius, aperit limites, vastat agros, urit domos, 
fundit obvios ; maximaque cum gloria, iucolumi omnium, 
quos transduxerat, numero, in hiberna revertitur. Red- 
datur verum L. Asprenati testimonium ; qui legatus sub 
avunculo suo Varo militans, nava virilique opera duarum 
legionum, quibus praeerat, exercitum immunem tanta cala- 
mitate servavit ; matureque ad inferiora hiberna descendendo, 
vacillantes jam cis Rhenum sitarum gentium animos con- 
firmavit. Sunt tamen, qui, ut vivos ab eo vindicatos, ita 
jugulatorum sub Varo occupata crediderint patrimonia, here- 
ditatemque excisi exercitus, in quantum voluerit, ab eo adi- 
tam. Lucii etiam Csedicii, praefecti castrorum, eorumque qui 
una circumdati Alisone immensis Germanorum copiis obside- 
bantur, laudanda virtus est ; qui, omnibus difficultatibus 
superatis, quas inopia rerum intolerabiles, vis hostium faciebat 
inexsuperabiles, nee temerario consilio, nee segni providentia 
usi, sj)eculatique opportunitatem, ferro sibi ad suos peperere 
reditum. Ex quo apparet Varum, sane gravem et bonte 
voluntatis virum, magis imperatoris defectum consilio, quam 
virtute destitutum militum, se magnificentissimumque perdi- 



PROLEGOMENA. XC111 

disse exercitum. Cum in captivos sseviretur a Geraianis, prse- 
clari facinoris auctor fait Caldus Doelius, adolescens vetustate 
farniliee suee dignissimus : qui, complexus catenarum, quibus 
vinctus erat, seriem, ita illas illisit capiti [suo], ut protinus 
pariter sanguinis cerebrique influvio exspiraret. 

CXXI. Eaclem et virtus et fortuna subsequenti tempore 
[ingressa animum] irnperatoris Tiberii fait, quse initio fuerat. 
Qui, contusis hostium viribus, classicis peditumque expedi- 
tionibus, cum res Galliarum maximse molis, accensasque ple- 
bis Viennensium dissensiones, coercitione magis quam poana 
mollisset ; et senatus populusque Eomanus, postulante patre 
ejus, ut eequum ei jus in omnibus provinciis exercitibusque 
esset [quam erat ipsi], decreto complexus esset. (Etenim 
absurdum erat, non esse sub illo, quse ab illo vindicabantur ; 
et qui ad opem ferendam primus erat, ad vindicandum 
honorem non judicare parem) : in Urbem reversus, jam 
pridem debitum, sed continuatione bellorum dilatum, ex Pan- 
noniis Delmatisque egit triumpbum. Cujus magnificentiam 
quis miretur in Oeesare ? Fortunee vero quis non miretur 
indulgentiam I quippe omnes eminentissimos hostium duces, 
non occisos fama narravit, sed vinctos triumphus ostendit. 
Quem mihi, fratrique meo, inter prsecipuos prascipuisque 
donis adornatos viros comitari contigit. 

OXXII. Quis non inter reliqua, quibus singularis mode- 
ratio Tib. Caesaris elucet atque eminet, hoc quoque miretur, 
quod, cum sine ulla dubitatione septem triumphos meruerit, 
tribus contentus fuerit I Quis enim dubitare potest, quin 
ex Armenia recepta, et ex rege ei prseposito, cujus capiti 
insigne regium sua manu imposuerat, ordinatisque rebus 
Orientis, ovans triumphare debuerit ? et, Vindelicorum Ehse- 
torumque victor, curru urbem ingredi ? Fractis deinde post 
adoptionem continua triennii militia Germanias viribus, idem 
illi honor et deferendus et recipiendus fuerit l et post cla- 
dem sub Varo acceptam, ocius prosperrimo rerum eventu 
eadem excisa Germania triumphum summi ducis adornare 
debuerit ? Sed in hoc viro nescias, utrum magis mireris, 
quod laborum periculorumque semper excessit modum, an, 
quod honorem temperavit. 



xciv THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

TACIT. ANN. I. 

LV. Druso Csesare, C. Norbano consulibus, decernitur 
Germanico triumphus, nianente bello ; quod quamquam in 
sestatem summa ope parabat, initio veris, et repentino in 
Cattos cxcursu, prrecepit : nam spes incesserat dissidere lios- 
tem in Arrniniuni ac Segestem, insignem utrumque perfidia 
in nos, aut fide. Arminius turbator Germanise : Segestes, 
" parari rebellionem " ssepe alias, et supremo convivio, post 
quod in arma itum, aperuit : suasitque Varo, " ut se, et 
Arminium, et ceteros proceres vinciret : nihil ausuram 
plebem, principibus amotis ; atque ipsi tempus fore, quo 
crimina, et innoxios discerneret : ,1 sed Varus fato, et vi 
Arminii cecidit. Segestes, quamquam consensu gentis in 
bellum tractus, discors manebat, auctis privatim odiis, quod 
Arminius filiam ejus, alii pactam, rapuerat ; gener invisus, 
inimici soceri ; quaeque apud Concordes vincula caritatis, in- 
citamenta irarum apud infensos erant. 

LVI. Igitur Germanicus quatuor legiones, quinque auxi- 
liarium millia, et tumultuarias catervas Germanorum cis 
Rhenum colentium, Cfecinae tradit : totidem legiones, du- 
plicem sociorum numerum ipse ducit ; positoque castello super 
vestigia paterni prwsidii in monte Tauno, expeditum exercitum 
in Cattos rapit ; L. Apronio ad munitiones viarum et flumi- 
num relicto. Nam, rarum illi ccelo, siccitate, et amnibus 
modicis inoftensum iter properaverat ; imbresque et fluminum 
auctus regredienti metuebatur. Sed Cattis adeo improvisus 
advenit, ut quod imbecillum aetate ac sexu, statim captum, 
aut trucidatum sit. Juventus flumen Adranam nando tra- 
miserat, Romanosque pontem coeptantes arcebant : dein tor- 
mentis sagittisque pulsi, tentatis frustra conditionibus pacis, 
cum quidam ad Germanicum perfugissent, reliqui, omissis 
pagis vicisque, in silvas disperguntur. Caesar incenso Mattio 
(id genti caput) aperta populatus, vertit ad Rhenum : non 
auso hoste terga abeuntium lacessere, quod illi moris, quotiens 
astu magis, quam per formidinem cessit. Fuerat animus 
Cheruscis juvare Cattos, sed exterruit Caecina hue illuc ferens 
arma ; et Marsos congredi ausos, prospero proslio cohibuit. 

LVII. Neque multo post legati a Segeste venerunt, auxi- 
lium orantes adversus vim popularium, a quis circumsede- 



PROLEGOMENA. XCV 

batur ; validiore apud eos Arminio, quando bellum suadebat. 
Nam barbaris, quanto quis auclacia promptus, tanto magis 
fidus, rebusque motis potior habetur. Addiderat Segestes 
le^atis filium, nomine Segimundum : sed juvenis conscientia 
cunctabatur : qnippe anno, quo Germanise descivere, sacerdos 
apud Aram Ubiorum creatus, ruperat vittas, profugus ad 
rebelles. Adductus tamen in spem clementiae Rouianae, per- 
tulit patris mandata, benigneque exceptus cum praesidio 
Gallicam in ripam missus est. Germanico pretium fuit, con- 
vertere agmen : pugnatumque in obsidentes, et ereptus 
Segestes magna cum propinquorum et clientium manu. In- 
erant feminee nobiles, inter quas uxor Arminii, eademque filia 
Segestis, mariti magis quam parentis animo, neque victa in 
lacrimas, neque voce supplex, compressis intra sinum manibus, 
gravidum uterum intuens. Ferebantur et spolia Varianse 
cladis, plerisque eorum, qui turn in deditionem veniebant, 
prsedse data. Simul Segestes ipse ingens visu, et memoria 
bonae societatis impavidus : verba ejus in hunc modum fuere. 

LVIII. " Non hie mihi primus erga populum Romanum 
fidei . et constantiae dies : ex quo a divo Augusto civitate 
donatus sum, amicos inimicosque ex vestris utilitatibus delegi : 
neque odio patriae (quippe proditores, etiam iis quos ante- 
ponunt, invisi sunt), verum quia Romanis Germanisque idem 
conducere ; et pacem, quam bellum probabam. Ergo rapto- 
rem filise meae, violatorem foederis vestri Arminium, apud 
Varum, qui turn exercitui praesidebat, reum feci : dilatus 
segnitia ducis, quia parurn praesidii in legibus erat, ut me, et 
Arminium, et conscios vinciret, flagitavi. Testis ilia nox, 
mihi utinam potius novissima ! Qua? secuta sunt, defleri 
magis, quam defendi possunt : ceterum et injeci catenas 
Arminio, et a factione ejus injectas perpessus sum. Atque 
ubi primum tui copia, Vetera novis, et quieta turbidis ante- 
habeo : neque ob praemium, sed ut me perfidia exsolvam ; 
simul genti Germanorum idoneus conciliator, si poenitentiam 
quam perniciem maluerit. Pro juventa et errore filii veniam 
precor : filiam necessitate hue adductam fateor : tuum erit 
consultare, utrum praevaleat, quod ex Arminio concepit, an 
quod ex me genita est." Caesar, dementi responso, liberis 
propinquisque ejus incolumitatem, ipsi sedem Vetera, in pro- 



XCVl THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

vincia, pollicetur. Exercitum reduxit, nomenque imperatoria 

auctore Tiberio accepit. Arminii uxor, virilis sexus stirpem 
edidit : educatus Ravennse puer, quo mox ludibrio conflictatus 
sit, in tempore memorabo. 

LIX. Fama dediti benigneque excepti Segestis vulgata, 
ut quibusque bellum invitis aut cupientibus erat, spe vel 
dolore accipitur. Arminium, super insitam violentiam, rapta 
uxor, subjectus servitio uxoris uterus, vecordern agebant : 
volitabatque per Cheruscos, arma in Segestem, anna in 
Caesarem poscens : neque probris temperabat. "Egregium 
patrem ! magnum imperatorem ! fortem exercitum ! quorum 
tot manns unam mulierculam avexeriut. Sibi tres legiones, 
totidem legatos procubuisse. Non euim se proditione, neque 
adversus feminaa gravidas, sed palam adversus armatos bellum 
tractare : cerni adhuc Germanorum in lucis signa Romana, 
quae diis patriis suspenderit: coleret Segestes victam ripam ; 
redderet filio sacerdotium : hominem Germanos numquam 
satis excusaturos, quod inter Albim et Rhenum virgas, et 
secures, et togam viderint. Aliis gentibus, ignorantia im- 
perii Romani, inexperta esse supplicia, nescia tributa : . quae 
quando exuerint, inritusque discesserit ille inter numina dica- 
tus Augustus, ille delectus Tiberius, ne imperitum adolescen- 
tulum, ne seditiosum exercitum pavescerent. Si patriam, 
parentes, antiqua mallent, quam dominos, et colonias novas ; 
Arminium potius glorise ac libertatis, quam Segestem flagi- 
tiosae servitutis ducem sequerentur." 

LX. Conciti per haec non modo Cherusci, sed conterminse 
gentes ; tractusque in partes Inguiomerus Arminii patruus, 
veteri apud Romanos auctoritate : unde major Csesari metus : 
et ne bellum mole una ingrueret, Caecinam cum quadraginta 
cohortibus Romanis, distrahendo hosti, per Bructeros ad 
flumen Amisiam mittit : equitem Pedo prtefectus, finibus 
Frisiorum ducit : ipse impositas navibus quatuor legiones per 
lacus vexit : simulque pedes, eques, classis, apud praedictum 
amnem convenere. Chauci cum auxilia pollicerentur, in com- 
militium adsciti sunt. Bructeros sua urentes, expedita cum 
maim L. Stertinius, missu Germanici fudit, interque caedem et 
praedam reperit undevicesimae legionis aquilam cum Varo 
amissam. Ductum inde agmen ad ultimos Bructerorum : 



PROLEGOMENA. XCVll 

quantumque Amisiam et Luppiam amnes inter, vastatum ; 
haud procul Teutoburgiensi saltu, in quo reliquiae Vari legi- 
onumque insepultae dicebantur. 

LXI. Igitur cupido Csesarem invadit solvendi suprema 
militibus, ducique ; permoto ad miserationem orani, qui ad- 
erat, exercitu, ob propinquos, amicos, denique ob casus bel- 
le-rum et sortem hominum. Praemisso Cascina, nt occulta 
saltuuni scrutaretur, pontesque et aggeres humido pallidum et 
fallacious campis imponeret, incedunt mojstos locos, visuque ac 
memoria deformes. Prima Vari castra, lato ambitu, et di- 
mensis principiis, trium legionum manus ostentabant : dein 
semiruto vallo, humili fossa, accisae jam reliquiae consedisse 
intelligebantur : medio campi albentia ossa, ut fugerant, ut 
restiterant, disjecta vel aggerata : adjacebant fragmina 
telorum, equorumque artus, simul truncis arborum antefixa 
ora ; lucis propinquis , barbarae arae, apud quas tribunos, ac 
primorum ordinum centuriones mactaverant : et cladis ejus 
superstites pugnam aut vincula elapsi, referebant, " hie ceci- 
disse legatos ; illic raptas aquilas ; primum ubi vulnus Varo 
adactum ; ubi infelici dextra, et suo ictu mortem invenerit : 
quo tribunali concionatus Arminius ; quot patibula captivis, 
quae scrobes ; utque signis et aquilis per superbiam inluserit.' n 

LXII. Igitur Kiomanus, qui aderat, exercitus, sextum 
post cladis annum, trium legionum ossa, nullo noscente alienas 
reliquias an suorum humo tegeret, omnes ut conjunctos, ut 
consanguineos, aucta in hostem ira, mcesti simul et infensi 
condebant. Primum exstruendo tumulo cespitem Caesar 
posuit, gratissimo munere in defunctos, et praesentibus doloris 
socius. Quod Tiberio haud probatum ; seu cuncta Germanici 
in deterius trahenti ; sive exercitum imagine caesorum inse- 
pultorumque tardatum ad proelia, et formidolosiorem hostium 
credebat : " neque imperatorem auguratu et vetustissimis 
ceerimoniis praeditum, adtrectare feralia debuisse. 11 

LXIII. Sed Germanicus cedentem in avia Arminium 
secutus, ubi primum copia fuit, evehi equites, campumque, 
quern hostis insederat, eripi jubet. Arminius colligi suos, et 
propinquare silvis monitos, vertit repente ; mox signum pro- 
rumpendi dedit iis, quos per saltus occultaverat. Tunc nova 
acie turbatus eques, missaeque subsidiariae cohortes, et fugien- 

h 



XCviii THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

tiimi agmine impulsae, auxerant consternationem : trudeban- 
turque in paludem gnaram vincentibus, iniquam nesciis, ni 
Caesar productas legiones instruxisset : inde hostibus terror, 
fiducia militi : et manibus acquis abscessum. Mox reducto ad 
Aruisiam exercitu, legiones classe, ut advexerat, reportat. 
Pars equitum litore Oceani petere Rhenum jussa. Caecina, 
qui suum militein ducebat, monitus, quamquam notis itineribus 
regrederctur, pontes longos quam maturrime superare. An- 
gustus is trames, vastas inter paludes, et quondam a L. 
Domitio aggeratus : cetera limosa, tenacia gravi cceno, aut 
rivis incerta erant : circum silvas paullatiui adclives ; quas 
turn Arminius implevit, conipendiis viarum, et cito agmine, 
onustum sarcinis armisque militem cum antevenisset. Ca> 
cinae, dubitanti quonam modo ruptos vetustate pontes repo- 
neret, simulque propulsaret hostem, castrametari in loco 
placuit ; ut opus, et alii proclium inciperent. 

LXIY. Barbari perfringere stationes, seque inferre muni- 
toribus nisi, lacessunt, circumgrediuntur, occursant : miscetur 
operantium bellantiumque clamor : et cuncta pariter Roinanis 
adversa ; locus uligine profunda, idem ad gradum instabilis, 
procedentibus lubricus ; corpora gravia loricis, neque librare 
pila inter undas poterant. Contra Cheruscis sueta apud 
paludes proelia, procera membra, hastae ingentes ad vulnera 
facienda, quamvis procul : nox demum inclinantes turn legiones 
adversae pugnae exemit. Germani ob prospera indefessi, ne 
turn quidem sumpta quiete, quantum aquarum circumsurgen- 
tibus jugis oritur, vertere in subjecta : mersaque humo, et 
obruto quod effectum operis, duplicatus militi labor. Quadra- 
gesimum id stipendium Cascina parendi aut imperitandi 
habebat : secundarum ambiguarumque rerum sciens, eoque 
interritus. Igitur futura volvens, non aliud reperit, quam 
ut hostem silvis coerceret, donee saucii, quantum que gravioris 
agminis, anteirent : nam medio montium et paludum porrige- 
batur planicies, quae tenuem aciem pateretur. Deliguntur 
legiones, quinta dextro lateri ; unaetvicesima in laevum ; pri- 
mani ducendum ad agmen ; vicesimanus adversum secuturos. 

LXV. Nox per diversa inquies : cum barbari festis epulis, 
laeto cantu, aut truci sonore subjecta vallium ac resultantes 
saltus complerent ; apud Romanos invalidi ignes, interruptae 



PROLEGOMENA. XC1X 

voces, atque ipsi passim adjacerent vallo, oberrarent tentoriis, 
insomnes magis quam pervigiles. Ducemque terruit dira 
quies : nam Quinctilium Varum sanguine oblitum, et palu- 
dibus emersum, cernere et audire visus est, velut vocantem, 
non tamen obsecutus, et manum intendentis repulisse. 
Coepta luce, missse in latera legiones metu, an contumacia, 
locum deseruere : capto propere campo, humentia ultra. 
Neque tamen Arminius, quamquam libero incursu, statim 
prorupit : sed ut hsesere C03110 fossisque impedimenta, turbati 
circum milites, incertus signorum ordo, utque tali in tempore 
sibi quisque properus, et lentee adversum imperia aures, ir- 
rumpere Germanos jubet, clamitans, " En Varus, et eoclem 
iterum fato victse legiones ! " Simul haec ; et cum delectis 
scindit agmen, equisque maxime vulnera ingerit : illi sanguine 
suo, et lubrico pallidum lapsentes, excussis rectoribus disjicere 
obvios, proterere jacentes : plurimus circa aquilas labor, quae 
neque adversum ferri ingruentia tela, neque figi limosa humo 
poterant. Csecina dum sustentat aciem, suffosso equo dela- 
psus circumveniebatur, ni prima legio sese opposuisset : juvit 
hostium aviditas, omissa csede, praedam sectantium ; enisaeque 
legiones, vesperascente die, in aperta et solida : neque is 
miseriarum finis : struendum vallum, petendus agger : amissa 
magna ex parte, per quae egeritur humus, aut exciditur 
cespes : non tentoria manipulis, non fomenta sauciis : infectos 
coeno aut cruore cibos dividentes, funestas tenebras, et tot 
hominum millibus unum jam reliquum diem lamentabantur. 

LXVI. Forte equus abruptis vinculis vagus, et clamore 
territus, quosdam occurrentium obturbavit : tanta inde con- 
sternatio inrupisse Germanos credentium, ut cuncti ruerent ad 
portas ; quarum Decumana maxime petebatur, aversa hosti, 
et fugientibus tutior. Csecina, comperto vanam esse formi- 
dinem, cum tamen neque auctoritate, neque precibus, ne 
manu quidem obsistere, aut retinere militem quiret ; projectus 
in limine porta?, miseratione demum, quia per corpus legati 
eundum erat, clausit viam : simul tribuni et centuriones 
falsum pavorem docuerunt. 

LXVII. Tunc contractos in principia, jussosque dicta 
cum silentio accipere, temporis ac necessitatis monet. " Unam 
in armis salutem, sed ea consilio temperanda : manendumque 

h 2 



C THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

intra vallum, donee expugnandi liostes spe, propius succede- 
rent : mox undique erumpendum : ilia eruptione ad Rhenura 
pcrveniri : quod si fugerent, plures silvas, profundas magis 
paludes, ssevitiam hostium superesse : at victoribus decus, 
gloriam : quae domi cara, quae in castris honesta, 11 memorat : 
reticuit de adversis. Equos dehinc, orsus a suis, legatorum 
tribunorumque nulla ambitione, fortissimo cuique bellatori 
tradit, ut hi, mox pedes, in hostem invaderent. 

LXVIII. Haud minus inquies Germanus, spe, citpidine, 
et diversis ducum sententiis agebat : Arminio, " sinerent 
egredi, egressosque rursum per humida et impedita cireum- 
venirent," suadente : atrociora Inguiomero, et laeta barbaris, 
" ut vallum armis ambirent : promptam expugnationem, plures 
captivos, incorruptam praedam fore.'' 1 Igitur orta die, pro- 
ruunt fossas, injiciunt crates, summa valli prensant, raro super 
milite, et quasi ob metum defixo. Postquam hsesere muni- 
mentis, datur cohortibus signum, cornuaque ac tubas con- 
cinuere : exin clamore et impetu tergis Germanorum circum- 
funduntur exprobrantes, "non hie silvas, nee paludes, sed 
acquis locis tequos deos." Hosti, facile excidium, et paucos et 
semermos cogitanti, sonus tubarum, fulgor armorum, quanto 
inopina, tanto majora offunduntur ; cadebantque, ut rebus 
secundis avidi, ita adversis incauti. Arminius integer, Inguio- 
merus post grave vulnus, pugnam deseruere ; vulgus truci- 
datum est, donee ira et dies permansit. Nocte demum 
reversal legiones, quamvis plus vulnerum, eadem ciborum 
egestas fatigaret, vim, sanitatem, copias, cuncta in victoria 
habuere. 

LXIX. Pervaserat interim " circumventi exercitus" fama, 
et " infesto Germanorum agmine Gallias peti : " ac ni Agrip- 
pina impositum Rheno pontem solvi prohibuisset, erant qui 
id flagitium formidine auderent : sed femina ingens animi, 
munia ducis per eos dies induit, militibusque ut quis inops, 
aut saucius 5 vestem et fomenta dilargita est. Tradit 0. 
Plinius, Germanicorum bellorum scrip tor, stetisse apud prin- 
cipium pontis, laudes et grates reversis legionibus habentem. 
Id Tiberii animum altius penetravit. " Non enim simplices 
eas curas : nee adversus externos militem quasri : nihil re- 
lictum imperatoribus, ubi femina manipulos intervisat, signa 



PROLEGOMENA. ci 

adeat, largitionem tentet, tamquam parum ambitiose filium 
ducis gregali liabitu circumferat. Csesaremque Caligularn ap- 
pellari velit. Potiorem jam apud exercitus Agrippinam, 
quam legatos, quam duces : compressam a muliere seditionem, 
cui nomen principis obsistere non quiverit." Accendebat hsec 
onerabatque Sejanus, peritia morum Tiberii, odia in longum 
jaciens, quse reconderet, auctaque promeret. 

LXX. At Germanicus legionum, quas navibus vexerat, 
secundam et quartamdecimam itinere terrestri P. Vitellio 
ducendas tradit, quo levior classis vadoso mari innaret, vel 
reciproco sideret. Vitellius primum iter sicca humo, aut 
modice adlabente sestu, quietum habuit. Mox impulsu aqui- 
lonis, simul sidere sequinoctii, quo maxime tumescit Oceanus, 
rapi agique agmen : et opplebantur terrse : eaclem freto, litori, 
campis facies : neque discerni poterant incerta ab solidis, 
brevia a profundis. Sternuntur fluctibus, hauriuntur gurgi- 
tibus : jumenta, sarcinse, corpora exanima interfluunt, occur- 
sant : permiscentur inter se manipuli, modo pectore, modo 
ore tenus exstantes, aliquando subtracto solo disjecti aut 
obruti : non vox, et mutui hortatus juvabant, adversante 
unda : nihil strenuus ab ignavo, sapiens ab imprudenti, con- 
silia a casu differre : cuncta pari violentia involvebantur. 
Tandem Vitellius in editiora enisus, eodem agmen subduxit : 
pernoctavere sine utensilibus, sine igni, magna pars nudo aut 
mulcato corpore, haud minus miserabiles, quam quos hostis 
circumsidet : quippe illis etiam honestas mortis usus, his in- 
glorium exitium : lux reddidit terrain ; penetratumque ad 
amnem Unsingin, quo Csesar classe contenderat : impositae 
deinde legiones, vagante fama submersas; nee fides salutis, 
antequam Csesarem exercitumque reducem videre. 

LXXI. Jam Stertinius ad accipiendum in deditionem 
Segimerum fratrem Segestis prsemissus, ipsum et filium ejus 
in civitatem Ubiorum perduxerat : data utrique venia, facile 
Segimero, cunctantius filio : quia Qumctilii Vari corpus in- 
lusisse dicebatur. Oeterum ad supplenda exercitus damna 
certavere Gallise, Hispanias, Italia ; quod cuique promptum, 
arma, equos, aurum offerentes : quorum laudato studio Ger- 
manicus, armis modo et equis ad bellum sumptis, propria 
pecunia militem juvit. Utque cladis memoriam etiam comi- 



Cll THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

tate leniret, circumire saucios; facta singulorum extollere ; 
vulnera intuens, alium spe, alium gloria, cunctos alloquio et 
cura, sibique et prcelio firmabat. 

TACIT. ANN. II. 

V. Ceterum Tiberio hautl ingratum accidit turbari res 
Orientis, ut .ea specie Germanicum suetis legionibus abstra- 
beret ; novisque provinciis impositum, dolo simul et casibus 
objectaret. At ille, quanto acriora in eum studia militura, et 
aversa patrui voluntas, celerandse victorias intentior, tractare 
prccliorum vias, et quae sibi tertium jam annum belligeranti 
saeva vel prospera evenissent : "fundi Germanos acie et justis 
locis ; juvari silvis, paludibus, brevi estate, et praematura 
hieme: suum militem baud perinde vulneribus, quam spatiis 
itinerant, damno armorum adfici : fessas Gallias ministrandis 
equis : longum impedimentorum agmen, opportunum ad in- 
sidias, defensantibus iniquum. At si mare intretur, prom- 
|)t;mi ipsia possessionem, et liostibus ignotam : simul bellum 
maturius incipi, legionesque et commeatus pariter vein : in- 
tegrum equitem, equosque, per ora et alveos fluminum media 
in Germania fore." 

VI. Igitur buc iutendit : missis ad census Galliarum, 
P. Vitellio et C. Antio; Silius, et Anteius, et Carina fabri- 
candse classi prscponuntur. Mille naves sufficere visas, pro- 
peratseque : alia? breves, angusta puppi proraque, et lato utero, 
quo facilius fluctos tolerarent : quaedaui planse carinis, ut sine 
noxa siderent : plures, adpositis utrimque gubernaculis, con- 
verso ut repente remigio, hinc vel illinc adpellerent : multas 
pontibus stratae, super quas tormenta veherentur, simul aptae 
ferendis equis aut commeatui, velis habiles, citse remis, auge- 
bantur alacritate militum in speciem ac terrorem. Insula 
Batavorum in quam convenirent praedicta, ob faciles adpulsus, 
accipiendisque copiis, et transmittendum ad bellum opportuna. 
Nam Rhenus uno alveo continuus, aut modicas insulas cir- 
cumveniens, apud principium agri Batavi, velut in duos amnes 
dividitur, servatque nomen et violentiam cursus, qua Ger- 
maniam praevehitur, donee Oceano misceatur : ad Gallicam 
ripam latior et placidior adfluens, verso cognomento Vahalem 
accolae dicunt : mox id quoque vocabulum mutat Mosa 



PROLEGOMENA. ciii 

flumine, ejusque immenso ore eundem in Oceanum effun- 
ditur. 

VII. Sed Osesar, dum adiguntur naves, Silium legatum 
cum expedita inarm inruptionem m Oattos facere jubet : ipse, 
audito castellum Luppias flumini adpositum obsideri, sex 
legiones eo duxit. Neque Silk- ob subitos imbres aliud 
actum, quain ut modicam prsedam, et Arpi principis Oattorum 
conjugem filiamque raperet : neque Ceesari copiam pugnse 
obsessores fecere, ad famam adventus ejus dilapsi. Tumulum 
tamen nuper Varianis legionibus structum, et veterem aram 
Druso sitam disjecerant : restituit aram ; honorique patris 
princeps ipse cum legionibus decucurrit. Tumulum iterare 
haud visum : et cuncta inter castellum Alisonem, ac Rhenum, 
novis limitibus, aggeribusque permunita. 

VIII. Jamque classis advenerat, cum prsemisso commeatu, 
et distributis in legiones ac socios navibus, fossam, cui Drusianse 
nomen, ingressus, precatusque Drusum patrem, " ut se eadem 
ausum, libens placatusque exemplo ac memoria consiliorum 
atque operum juvaret : " lacus inde et Oceanum usque ad 
Amisiam flumen secunda navigatione pervehitur : classis 
Amisiss relicta, Isevo amne ; erratumque in eo, quod non 
subvexit : transposuit militem dextras in terras iturum : ita 
plures dies efficiendis pontibus absumpti. Et eques quidem 
ac legiones prima sestuaria, nondum adcrescente unda, iutre- 
pidi transiere : postremum auxiliorum agmen, Batavique in 
parte ea, dum insultant aquis, artemque nandi ostentant, tur- 
bati, et quidam hausti sunt. Metanti castra Caesari Angriva- 
riorum defectio a tergo nuntiatur : missus illico Stertinius 
cum equite et armatura levi, igne et ceedibus perfidiam ultus 
est. 

IX. Flumen Visurgis Eomanos Cheruscosque interfluebat : 
ejus in ripa cum ceteris primoribus Arminius adstitit, qusesi- 
toque " an Csesar venisset ? " postquam " adesse " responsum 
est, " ut liceret cum fratre conloqui " oravit. Erat is in exer- 
citu cognomento Flavius, insignis fide, et amisso per vulnus 
oculo paucis ante annis, duce Tiberio : tam permissum ; pro- 
gressusque salutatur ab Arminio : qui amotis stipatoribus ; 
" ut sagittarii nostra pro ripa dispositi abscederent,'" postulat ; 
et postquam digressi, " unde ea cleformitas oris ? " interrogat 



civ THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

fratrem : illo locum, et proelium referente, " quodnam praemium 
recepisset " exquirit. Flavius " aucta stipendia, torquem, et 
coronam, aliaque militaria dona" memorat, inridente Arminio 
vilia servitii pretia. 

X. Exin diversi ordiuntur : hie " magnitudinem Roma- 
nam, opes Csesaris, et victis graves pcenas ; in deditionera 
venienti paratam clementiam ; neque conjugem et filium ejus 
hostiliter haberi." Ille " fas patriae, libertatem avitam, pene- 
t rales Germanise deos, matrem precum soeiam ; ne propin- 
quorum et adfinium, denique gentis suae desertor et proditor, 
quam imperator esse mallet." Paullatim iixle ad jurgia pro- 
lapsi, quominus pugnam consererent, ue flumiue quidem inter- 
jecto cohibebantur; ne Stertinius adcurrens, plenum irse, 
" armaque et equum " poscentem Flavium attinuisset. Oerne- 
batur contra minitabundus Arminius, proeliumque denuntians : 
nam pleraque Latino sermone interjaciebat, ut qui Romanis in 
castris ductor populariuin meruisset. 

XL Postero die, Germanorum acies trans Visurgim 
stetit. Csesar, nisi pontibus prsesidiisque impositis, dare in 
discrimen legiones baud imperatorium ratus, equitem vado 
tramittit : pracfuere Stertinius, et e numero primipilarium 
iEmilius, distantibus locis invecti, ut hostem diducerent. 
Qua celerrimus amnis, Cariovalda dux Batavorum erupit : 
eum Cherusci fugam simulantes, in planitiem saltibus circum- 
jectam traxere : dein coorti, et undique effusi trudunt ad- 
versos, instant cedentibus, collectosque in orbem, pars con- 
gressi, qui dam eminus proturbant. Cariovalda, diu sustentata 
hostium saevitia, hortatus suos ut ingruentes catervas globo 
frangerent, atque ipse in densissimos inrumpens, congestis telis 
et suffosso equo labitur, ac multi nobilium circa : ceteros vis 
sua, aut equites cum Stertinio iEmilioque subvenientes, peri- 
culo exemere. 

XII. Csesar transgressus Visurgim, indicio perfugae cog- 
noscit, "' delectum ab Arminio locum pugnse ; convenisse et 
alias nationes in silvam Herculi sacram, ausurosque nocturnam 
castrorum oppugnationem." Habita indici fides, et cerne- 
bantur ignes ; suggressique propius speculatores " audiri fre- 
mitum equorum, immensique et inconditi agminis murmur " 
attulere. Igitur propinquo summee rei discrimine, explo- 



PROLEGOMENA. CV 

randos rnilitum animos ratus, quonam id modo incorruptum 
foret, secum agitabat : " Tribunos et centuriones lseta saepius 
quam comperta nuntiare ; libertorum servilia ingenia ; amicis 
inesse adulationem : si concio vocetur, illic quoque, quae pauci 
incipiant, reliquos adstrepere : penitus noscendas mentes, cum 
secreti et incustoditi, inter militares cibos, spem aut raetum 
proferrent."' 1 

XIII. Nocte coepta, egressus augurali, per occulta et 
vigilibus ignara, comite uno, contectus humeros ferina pelle, 
adit castrorum vias, adsistit tabernaculis, fruiturque fama sui : 
cum hie " nobilitatem ducis," " decorem " alius, pluriori " pa- 
tientiam, comitatera, per seria, per jocos eumdem animuni, - " 
laudibus ferrent : " reddendamque gratiam in acie 11 faterentur : 
simul " perfidos et ruptores pacis, ultioni et glorise mactandos." 
Inter quae unus hostiuni Latinae linguae' sciens, acto ad vallum 
equo, voce magna, "conjuges, et agros, et stipendii in dies, 
donee bellaretur, sestertios centenos, si quis transfugisset," 
Arminii nomine pollicetur. Incendit ea contumelia legionum 
iras : " veniret dies, daretur pugna : sumpturum militem 
Germanorum agros, tracturum conjuges : accipere omen, et 
matrimonia ac pecunias hostium praedae destinare." Tertia 
ferme vigilia adsultatum est castris, sine conjectu teli, post- 
quam crebras pro munimentis cohortes, et nihil remissum 
sensere. 

XIV. Nox eadem laetam Grermanico quietem tulit, vidit- 
que se operatum, et sanguine sacro respersa praetexta, pul- 
chriorem aliam manibus aviae Augustas accepisse. Auctus 
omine, addicentibus auspiciis, vocat concionem, et quae sapi- 
entia praevisa, aptaque imminenti pugnae, disserit. " Non 
compos modo militi Romano ad proelium bonos, sed si ratio 
adsit, silvas et saltus : nee enim immensa barbarorum scuta, 
enormes hastas, inter truncos arborum, et enata liumo vir- 
gulta, perinde haberi quam pila, et gladios, et haerentia 
corpori tegmina : densarent ictus, ora mucronibus quaererent : 
non loricam Gfermano, non galeam ; ne scuta quidem ferro 
nervove firmata, sed viminum textus, vel tenues et fucatas 
colore tabulas : primam utcumque aciem hastatam ; ceteris, 
praeusta aut brevia tela : jam corpus, ut visu torvum, et ad 
brevem impetum validum, sic nulla vulnerum patientia : sine 



CV1 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

piulore flagitii, sine cura ducum, abire, fugere ; pavidoa ad- 

versis ; inter seeunda, non divini, non humani juris memores. 
Si tsedio viarum ac maris finem cupiant, hac acie parari : 
propiorem jam Albim, quam Rhenum : neque bellum ultra, 
modo se patris patruique vestigia prementem, iisdem in terris 
victorem sisterent." Orationem ducis secutus militum ardor ; 
signumqne pngnas datum. 

XV. Nee Arminius, aut ceteri Germanorum proceres 
omittebant suos quisque testari : " Hos esse Romanos Variani 
exercitus fugacissimos, qui ne bellum tolerarent, seditionem 
induerint : quorum pars onusta vulneribus tergum, pars fluc- 
tibus et procellis fractos artus, infensis rursum hostibus, 
adversis diis, objiciant, nulla boni spe. Classem quippe et avia 
Oceani qusesita, ne quis venientibus occurreret, ne pulsos 
premeret : sed ubi miscuerint manus, inane victis ventorum 
remorumque subsidium. Meminissent modo avaritise, crudeli- 
tatis, superbiae : aliud sibi reliquum, quam tenere libertatem, 
aut mori ante servitium I " 

XVI. Sic accensos et proelium poscentes in campum, cui 
Idistaviso nomen, deducunt : is medius inter Visurgim et 
colles, ut ripae fluminis cedunt, aut prominentia montium 
resistant, insequaliter sinuatur : pone tergum insurgebat silva, 
editis in altum ramis, et pura humo inter arborum truncos. 
Campum et prima silvarum, barbara acies tenuit : soli Che- 
rusci juga insedere, ut proeliantibus Romanis desuper incurre- 
rent. Noster exercitus sic incessit : auxiliares Galli, Ger- 
manique in fronte : post quos pedites sagittarii : dein quatuor 
legiones, et cum duabus prsetoriis cohortibus, ac delecto 
equite Caesar : exin totidem alise legiones, et levis armatura 
cum equite sagittario, ceterseque sociorum cohortes. Intentus 
paratusque miles, ut ordo agminis in aciem adsisteret. 

XVII. Visis Cheruscorum catervis, quae per ferociam 
proruperant, validissimos equitum incurrere latus, Stertinium 
cum ceteris turmis circumgredi, tergaque invadere jubet, ipse 
in tempore adfuturus. Interea pulcherrimum augurium, octo 
aquilee petere silvas, et intrare visse, imperatorem advertere : 
exclamat, " Irent, sequerentur Romanas aves, propria legio- 
num numina." Simul pedestris acies infertur ; et prsemissus 
eques, postremos ac latera impulit. Mirumque dictu, duo 



PROLEGOMENA. CVll 

hostium agmina diversa fuga, qui silvam tenuerant, in aperta, 
qui campis adstiterant, in silvam ruebant : medii inter hos 
Cherusci, collibus detrudebantur : inter quos insignis Armi- 
nius manu, voce, vulnere, sustentabat pugnam : incubuerat- 
que sagittariis, ilia rupturus, ni Rhsetorum Vindelicorunique, 
et Gallicse cohortes signa objecissent : nisu tamen corporis, et 
impetu equi pervasit, oblitus faciem suo cruore, ne nosceretur : 
quidam " agnitum a Chaucis inter auxilia Romana agentibus, 
emissumque" tradiderunt. Virtus, seu fraus eadem, Inguio- 
mero effugium dedit : ceteri passim trucidati. Et plerosque 
tranare Visurgim conantes, injecta tela ant vis fluminis post- 
remo moles ruentium, et incidentes ripse, operuere. Quidam 
turpi fuga in summa arborum nisi, ramisque se occultantes, 
admotis sagittariis per ludibrium figebantur : alios prorata? 
arbores adflixere. Magna ea victoria, neque cruenta nobis 
fuit. 

XVIII. Quinta ab hora diei ad noctem csesi hostes, 
decern millia passuum cadaveribus atque armis opplevere ; 
repertis inter spolia eorum catenis, quas in Romanos, ut non 
dubio eventu, portaverant. Miles in loco proelii, Tiberium 
Imperatorem salutavit, struxitque aggerem, et in modum 
tropbeeorum arma, subscriptis victarum gentium nominibus, 
imposuit. 

XIX. Haud perinde Grermanos vulnera, luctus, excidia, 
quam ea species dolore et ira adfecit : qui modo abire sedi- 
bus, trans Albim concedere parabant, pugnam volunt, arma 
rapiunt : plebes, primores, juventus, senes, agmen Romanum 
repente incursant, turbant : postremo deligunt locum, flumine 
et silvis clausum, arcta intus planitie, et humida : silvas 
quoque profunda palus ambibat, nisi quod latus unum Angri- 
varii lato aggere extulerant, quo a Olieruscis dirimerentur : 
hie pedes adstitit; equitem propinquis lucis texere, ut in- 
gressis silvam legionibus a tergo foret. 

XX. Nihil ex iis Osesari incognitum : consilia, locos, 
prompta, occulta noverat, astusque hostium in perniciem ipsis 
vertebat. Seio Tuberoni legato tradit equitem, campumque : 
peditum aciem ita instruxit, ut pars sequo in silvam aditu 
incederet, pars objectum aggerem eniteretur : quod arduum, 
sibi ; cetera legatis permisit. Quibus plana eveneraiit, facile 



cviii the Germany of tacitus. 

imupere : quis impugnandus agger, ut si murum succederent, 
gravibus superne ictibus conflictabantur. Sensit dux impa- 
rem cominus pugnam. remotisque paullum legionibus, fundi- 
tores libratoresque excutere tela, et proturbare hosteni jubet : 
missse e tormentis hastse, quantoque conspicui magis propu- 
gnatores, tanto pluribus vulneribus dejecti. Primus Ca3sar 
cum pretoriis coliortibus, capto vallo, dedit impetum in 
silvas: conlato illic gradu certatum : hostem a tergo palus, 
Romanos flumen aut montes elaudebant : utrisque necessitas 
in loco, spes in vii'tute, salus ex victoria. 

XXI. Nee minor Germanis animus, sed genere pugnse 
et armorum superabantur ; cum ingens multitudo, arctis locis, 
prselongas hastas non protenderet, non colligeret, neque 
adsultibus et velocitate corporum uteretur, coacta stabile ad 
proelium : contra miles, cui scutum pectori adpressum, et in- 
sidenscapulo man us, latos barbarorum artus, nuda ora foderet, 
viamque strage hostium aperiret : imprompto jam Arminio, 
ob continua pericula, sive ilium recens acceptum vulnus tar- 
daverat. Quin et Inguiomerum tota volitantem acie, fortuna 
magis quam virtus deserebat : et Germanicus, quo magis 
adgnosceretur, detraxerat tegimen capiti, orabatque " in- 
sisterent cacdibus, nil opus captivis, solam internecionem 
gentis finem bello fore. 1 ' Jamque sero diei subducit ex acie 
legionem, faciendis castris : cetera? ad noctem cruore hos- 
tium satiatse sunt : equites ambigue certavere. 

XXII. Laudatis pro concione victoribus, Caesar con- 
geriem armorum struxit, superbo cum titulo : debellatis 

INTER RHENUM ALBUIQUE NATIONIBUS EXERCITUM TIBERII C^ESARIS 
EA MONIMENTA MARTI ET JOVI ET AUGUSTO SACRA VISSE : de Se 

nihil addidit, metu invidise, an ratus conscientiam factis satis 
esse. Mox bellum in Angrivarios Stertinio mandat, ni 
deditionem properavissent : atque illi supplices, nihil ab- 
nuendo, veniam omnium accepere. 

XXIII. Sed sestate jam adulta, legionum alise itinere 
terrestri in hibernacula remissa? : plures Csesar classi impo- 
sitas per flumen Amisiam Oceano invexit. Ac primo pla- 
cidum sequor mille navium remis strepere, aut velis impelli : 
mox atro nubium globo effusa grando : simul variis undique 
procellis, incerti fluctus prospectum adimere, regimen impe- 



PROLEGOMENA. C1X 

dire : milesque pavidus, et casuum maris ignarus, dum turbat 
nautas, vel intempestive juvat, officia prudentium corrumpe- 
bat : omne dehinc coelum, et mare omne in austrum cessit, 
qui tumidis Germanise terris, profundis amnibus, immenso 
nubium tractu validus, et rigore vicini septemtrionis horri- 
dior, rapuit disjecitque naves in aperta Oceani, aut insulas 
saxis abruptis, vel per occulta vada infestas. Quibus paul- 
lum 83greque vitatis, postquam mutabat sestus, eodemque 
quo ventus ferebat ; non adhserere anchoris, non exhaurire 
inrumpentes undas poterant : equi, jumenta, sarcinse, etiam 
arma pra?cipitantur, quo levarentur alvei manantes per latera, 
et fluctu superurgente. 

XXIV. Quanto violentior cetero mari Oceanus, et tru- 
culentia cceli prsestat Germania, tantum ilia clades novitate 
et magnitudine excessit, hostilibus circum litoribus, aut ita 
vasto et profundo, ut credatur novissimum ac sine terris 
mare : pars navium haustse sunt ; plures, apud insulas longius 
sitas ejectse : milesque nullo illic hominum cultu, fame ab- 
sumptus, nisi quos corpora equorum eodem elisa tolerave- 
rant. Sola Germanici triremis Chaucorum terram adpulit ; 
quem per omnes illos dies noctesque, apud scopulos et pro- 
minentes oras, cum " se tanti exitii reum " clamitaret, vix 
cobibuere amici, quominus eodem mari oppeteret. Tandem 
relabente sestu, et secundante vento, claudee naves, raro 
remigio, aut intentis vestibus, et qusedam a validioribus 
tractse, revertere : quas raptim refectas misit, ut scrutarentur 
insulas : collecti ea cura plerique : multos Angrivarii nuper 
in fidem accepti, redemptos ab interioribus reddidere : quidam 
in Britanniam rapti, et remissi a regulis. Ut quis ex longin- 
quo revenerat, " miracula " narrabant, " vim turbinum, et 
inauditas volucres, monstra maris, ambiguas hominum et 
belluarum formas r 11 visa, sive ex metu credita. 

XXV. Sed fama classis amissse, ut Germanos ad spem 
belli, ita Csesarem ad coercendum erexit. 0. Silio cum 
triginta peditum, tribus equitum millibus ire in Oattos im- 
perat : ipse majoribus copiis Marsos inrumpit : quorum dux 
Malovendns nuper in deditionem acceptus, " propinquo luco 
defossam Variant legionis aquilam modico prsesidio servari" 
indicat. Missa extemplo manus, quae hostem a fronte eli- 



OX THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

ceret, alii qui terga circumgressi recluderent humum : et 
utrisque admit fortmia. Eo promptior Caesar pergit in- 
trorsus, populatur, exscindit non ausum congredi hostem : 
aut sicubi restiterat, statim pulsum, nee umquam magis, ut 
ex captivis cognitum est, paventein. Quippe " invictos et 
nullis casibus superabiles Romanos " praxlicabant, " qui perdita 
classe, amissis armis, post constrata equorum virorumque 
corporibus litora, eadem virtute, pari ferocia, et veluti aucti 
numero mrupissent." 

XXVI. Reductus inde in hiberna miles, laetus aninii, 
quod adversa maris, expeditione prospera pensavisset : ad- 
didit munificentiam Csesar, quantum quis damni professus 
crat, exsolvendo. Nee dubium habebatur, labare hostes, 
petendasque pacis consilia sumere, et si proxima sestas ad- 
jiceretur, posse bellum patrari : sed crebris epistolis Tiberius 
monebat, " rediret ad decretum triumplmm : satis jam even- 
tuum, satis casuum : prospera illi et magna proclia : eorum 
quoque meminisset, qua? venti et fluctus, nulla ducis culpa, 
gravia tamen et saeva damn a intulissent : se novies a divo 
Augusto in Germaniam missum, plura consilio quam vi per- 
fecisse. Sic Sugambros in deditionem acceptos, sic Suevos, 
regemque Maroboduum, pace obstrictum : posse et Cheru- 
scos, ceterasque rebellium gentes, quando Romance ultioni 
consultum esset, internis discordiis relinqui. , ' > Precante Ger- 
manico annum efficiendis coeptis, acrius modestiam ejus ad- 
greditur, alterum cousulatum offerendo, cujus munia prsesens 
obiret : simul adnectebat, " si foret adhuc bellandum, relin- 
queret materiem Drusi fratris glorise, qui nullo turn alio 
boste, nonnisi apud Germanias adsequi nomen imperatorium, 
et deportare lauream posset." Haud cunctatus est ultra 
Germanicus, quamquam fmgi ea seque per invidiam parto 
jam decori abstrahi intelligeret. 

TAC. ANN. II. 

XLIV. Nee multo post Drusus in Illyricum missus est, 
ut suesceret militise, studiaque exercitus pararet ; simul juve- 
nem urbano luxu lascivientem melius in castris haberi Ti- 
berius, seque tutiorem rebatur, utroque filio legiones obti- 
nente. Sed Suevi prastendebantur, auxilium adversus Che- 



PROLEGOMENA. CXl 

ruscos orantes : nam discessu Romanorum, ac vacui externo 
metu, gentis adsuetudine, turn et seniulatione gloriee, arma 
in se verterant : vis nationum, virtus ducum in aequo : sed 
Maroboduum regis nomen invisum apud populares ; Armi- 
nium pro libertate bellantem favor habebat. 

XLV. Igitur non modo Oherusci sociique eorum, vetus 
Arrninii miles, sumpsere bellum : sed e regno etiam Maro- 
bodui Suevse gentes, Semnones ac Langobardi, defecere ad 
eum : quibus additis prsepollebat, ni Inguiomerus cum manu 
clientium ad Maroboduum perfugisset ; non aliam ob causam, 
quam quia fratris filio juveni, patruus senex parere dedig- 
nabatur. Diriguntur acies pari utrimque spe, nee ut olim 
apud Geraianos vagis incursibus, aut disjectas per catervas : 
quippe longa adversum nos militia, insueverant sequi signa, 
subsidiis firmari, dicta imperatorum accipere. At tunc Ar- 
minius equo conlustrans cuncta, ut quosque advectus erat : 
" Reciperatam libertatem, trucidatas legiones, spolia adhuc 
et tela Romanis derepta, in manibus multorum " ostentabat : 
contra " fugacem Maroboduum " appellans, " proeliorum ex- 
pertem, Hercynise latebris defensum, ac mox per dona et 
legationes petivisse foedus, proditorem patriae, satellitem 
Ceesaris, haud minus infensis animis exturbandum, quam 
Varum Quinctilium interfecerint : meminissent modo tot prce- 
liorum, quorum eventu, et ad postremum ejectis Romanis, 
satis probatum, penes utros gumma belli fuerit." 

XLVI. Neque Maroboduus jactantia sui, aut probrig in 
hostem abstinebat : sed Inguiomerum tenens, '" Illo in corpore 
decus omne Oheruscorum, illius consiliis gesta, quae prospere 
ceciderint,"" testabatur : " vecordem Arminium, et rerum ne- 
scium, alienam gloriam in se trahere, quoniam tres vacuas 
legiones et ducem fraudis ignarum perfidia deceperit, magna 
cum clade Germanise, et ignominia sua, cum conjunx, cum 
filius ejus, servitium adhuc tolerent. At se duodecim legi- 
onibus petitum duce Tiberio, illibatam Germanorum gloriam 
servavisse : mox conditionibus acquis discessum : neque poeni- 
tere quod ipsorum in manu sit, integrum adversus Romanos 
bellum, an pacem incruentam 11^111^." His vocibus instinctos 
exercitus, proprise quoque causae stimulabant: cum a Che- 
ruscis Langobardisque, pro antiquo decore, aut recenti liber- 



CXii THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

tate ; et contra, augendse dominationi certaretur. Non alias 
majore mole concursum, neque ambigiio magis eventu, fusis 
utrimque dextris cornibus. Sperabaturque rursum pugna, 
ni Maroboduus castra in colles subdnxisset. Id signum 
perculsi fuit : et transfugis paullatim nudatus, in Marcoman- 
nos concessit, misitque legatos ad Tiberium oraturos auxilia. 
Responsum est, " non jure enra adversus Cheruscos arma 
Romana invocare, qui pugnantes in enmdem liostem Ro- 
manos nulla ope juvisset." Missus tamen Drusus, ut retu- 
limus, pacis firmator. 

TACIT. ANN. II. 

LXXXVIII. Reperio apud scriptores senatoresque eo- 
rumdem temporum, Adgandcstrii, principis Cattorum, lectas 
in senatu literas, quibus " mortem Arminii " promittebat, " si 
patrandae neci venerium mitteretur :" responsumque esse, 
" non fraude, neque occnltis, sed palam et armatum populum 
Romanum hostes suos ulcisci :" qua gloria rcquabat se Ti- 
berius priscis imperatoribus, qui venenum in Pyrrhum regem 
vetuerant, prodiderantque. Ceterum Arminius, abscedenti- 
bus Romanis, et pulso Maroboduo, regnum adfectans, liber- 
tatem popularium adversam habuit : petitusque armis, cum 
varia fortuna certaret, dolo propinquorum cecidit : liberator 
baud dubie Germanise, et qui non primordia populi Roinaui, 
sicut alii reges ducesque, sed florentissimum imperium laces- 
sierit : procliis ambiguus, bello non victus : se]Dtem et triginta 
annos vitce, duodecim potential explevit : caniturque adhuc 
barbaras apud gentes ; Grsccorum annalibus ignotus, qui sua 
tantum mirantur : Romanis baud perinde Celebris, dum Ve- 
tera extollimus, recentium incuriosi. 

Additional data may be collected from Dio Cassius 
(lvi. 18 — 24) ; but the extracts have already been so lengthy 
as to leave room only for the remarks of Niebuhr. 

LECTUKES CIX. CX. 

The German wars, which commenced in 740, were the 
consequence of the conquests in the Alps. The Sigambri 
seem before this time to have invaded the left bank of the 
Rhine in our neighbourhood ; but they had been repelled by 



PROLEGOMENA. CXlll 

the Romans, who advanced as far as the westward, though 
they did not make any conquests. In 740 the Romans 
attacked the Germans both on the Danube and on the Lower 
Rhine. The fact that such attacks were never made on the 
Upper Rhine, as far down as the river Lahn, shows that 
Suabia was not then a German country ; it did not become 
one until the Alemanni settled there. All we know about 
this war is vague and indefinite, and the account in Dion 
Oassius is unfortunately mutilated. It may have been in 
these campaigns that, as my friend Roth conjectures, Domi- 
tius Ahenobarbus penetrated into Germany across the Elbe 
in Bohemia ; for, in the subsequent invasions, we mostly find 
the Romans marching towards the Elbe from the Lower 
Rhine. The war was conducted by Tiberius 1 younger 
brother, Nero Claudius Drusus, in three campaigns. He 
advanced from the Lower Rhine across the Weser, as far as 
the Elbe, and subdued the Bructeri, Sigambri (who were 
then very renowned), Cherusci, and other tribes. The 
details of his campaign are not known, and localities are 
scarcely ever mentioned. Since the Germans had no towns, 
their only protection was the impassable nature of their 
country ; for they had no fortified places ; and, when they 
met the Romans in the open field, they were usually beaten, 
being unable to resist the military skill of the Romans. 
Their country was now ravaged; women and children were 
carried off into slavery, and the men were put to death like 
wild beasts ; for, although Drusus was otherwise of a mild 
disposition, considering what the Romans then were, yet he 
was, like Varus, a great sinner (a\trr]pio<;) towards the 
Germans. He died in his camp, not without a suspicion 
of Tiberius having caused his death ; but this may have been 
believed only on account of the hatred which Tiberius enter- 
tained against the family of his brother, especially against 
Germanicus. All that Tiberius could have feared was, that 
Drusus, like Germanicus, might indulge in the fair dream of 
restoring the republic. 

In 745, after the death of Drusus, Tiberius took the 
command ; and his triumph over the Germans was followed 
by his withdrawal to Rhodes. During the seven vears of 



CX1V THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

his absence, i'vw important events occurred, except that the 
Bructeri defeated the legate, M. Lollius, destroyed his legion, 
and captured the standards. After the return of Tiberius, 
he received the command in Gaul, to complete the subju- 
gation of Germany ; he penetrated as far as the Elbe, and 
reduced the Sigambri, Bructeri, and Cherusci, to obedience. 
On the Elbe, he was joined by the Roman fleet, which had 
been fitted out on the river Ems, or had come from the 
Rhine to the Ems. How it got up the Elbe cannot be ex- 
plained ; it may have gone up as. far as Magdeburg ; and 
yet the Roman galleys could not sail against the current, 
like steam-boats. After this campaign, Tiberius left Ger- 
many, as his predecessors had done, and as many of his 
successors did after him ; for the intention of the Romans 
was merely to crush the Germans, not to put themselves 
in possession of their country, which they can hardly have 
thought worth the trouble of occupying. 

While the Germans, north of the Thiiringer Wald and 
about the Harz Mountains, were thus visited by the Romans, 
there existed in Bohemia the great kingdom of Maroboduus, 
who is a strange and mysterious phenomenon in the early 
history of Germany. It is expressly stated that he had 
a large town (Roviasmum) for his capital, a regular army 
of seventy thousand men, and four thousand horsemen, a 
body-guard, and definite political institutions. Justus Moser 
is perfectly right in saying that the Germans, in the descrip- 
tions of the Romans, must not be conceived of as more un- 
civilized than the modern peasants of Westphalia, or Lower 
Saxony. Their dwelling-houses, one thousand eight hundred 
years ago, were, I believe, not different from the more com- 
mon ones in our own days, and the habitations of their 
chiefs were the same as the buildings of the middle ages. 
The notion that the ancient Germans were savages is com- 
pletely false ; they were neither more nor less than uncul- 
tivated country-people, to whom life in towns is altogether 
unknown. 

Venantius Fortunatus, in his poem to Radagunda, speaks 
of the ruined magnificence of her father's empire, and the 
brass-covered palaces of her ancestors, the kings of Thiiringia. 



PROLEGOMENA. CXV 

Moser has shown clearly that there is no ground whatever for 
seeking information respecting our forefathers in the forests 
of North America, or the islands of the South Sea, and yet 
people seem at present again inclined to go back to their 
notions. I do not mean to say that the habitations of the 
ancient Germans were the same in every respect as those 
of the present time, for in winter, e.g., they were, no doubt, 
obliged to have lights in the day-time, all the openings of 
the house being closed with boards, as they had no glass 
windows ; but this was the case in Rome itself; and similar 
houses still exist at Rome. I cannot, indeed, see why our 
ancestors of the fourteenth century should have been much 
more civilized than they were in the time of Augustus. Ma- 
roboduus, however, seems to have had a kingdom which was 
really in a state of civilization, with feudal institutions which 
had arisen out of his conquest of Bohemia ; for that country 
had before been inhabited by Boians ; that is, Kelts. Ti- 
berius intended to attack him on two sides ; he himself 
assembled his troops in Noricum and Vindelicia, and his 
legate, Sentius Saturninus, was to advance from the Rhine 
through the Hercynian and Thuringian forests. The Romans 
made great preparations, in constructing their roads through 
Germany. In this campaign we meet with the first traces 
of the unhappy divisions which characterize the whole his- 
tory of the Germans ; the northern tribes would not assist 
Maroboduus, because he had not assisted them ; he had 
allowed their power to be broken, so that, in fact, they 
hardly could assist him ; they also mistrusted him, because 
they believed that it was his intention to make himself 
master over them, as he had over the Marcomanni. * * * * 
Maroboduus had done nothing during the insurrection of 
the Pannonians and Dalmatians, although he must have 
known that preparations had been making against him. 
The whole of that part of Germany which lies between the 
Elbe, the Rhine, and the Westerwald, recognised the supre- 
macy of Rome, as early as the year 760 ; the Chauci, and 
other tribes on the coast of East Friesland and Oldenburg, 
were as much subjects of Rome as the Bructeri and Che- 
rusci in Westphalia. Quintilius Varus, who was descended 

i 2 



CXV1 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

from an ancient and illustrious patrician family, for his 
ancestors are mentioned in the earliest period of the republic, 
was a man of great ability, but of insatiable avarice. When 
he had the command of the army in Germany, he conducted 
himself completely as if he had been governor in a Roman 
province, which knew only compulsion and fear ; but Armi- 
nius, the Cheruscan, who had already distinguished himself 
in the Roman armies, probably in the Pannoniau war, 
devised a skilful plan for entrapping him. As the Germans 
had no fortified towns, it was exceedingly difficult to keep 
off the Romans, or to prevent their crossing the frontiers. 
The German horses were bad, but their riders were superior 
to the Romans; they were, however, excelled by the Gauls, 
on account of the better horses and armour of the latter, 
who were such excellent horsemen, that henceforth they 
formed the flower of the Roman armies, and most of the 
technical terms in horsemanship were borrowed from them. 
Cunning employed against tyranny is not wrong, so that I 
cannot despise the stratagem of Arminius, for the Germans 
had been attacked by the Romans in the most unjust manner. 
Arminius had served with German horsemen in the Roman 
armies ; he was quite master of the Latin language, he 
had obtained the Roman franchise, and the rank of an eques. 
By dint of the greatest perseverance, he and his comrades 
had succeeded in gaining the unlimited confidence of Varus, 
and contrived to lull him into security. Varus had his sta- 
tionary camp, in which he administered justice like a Roman 
governor in his province, and he made his judicial functions 
subservient to the purpose of enriching himself. His conduct 
was like that of the wicked governors in Switzerland. The 
Germans kept Varus engaged by fictitious quarrels among 
themselves, and made him believe that they felt very happy 
at the dawn of civilisation among them. The most profound 
peace seemed to be established, and many of the Roman 
soldiers were away from the camp on leave of absence. 
While Varus was indulging in this feeling of security, the 
tribes of Lower Saxony revolted, according to a preconcerted 
plan. Varus was induced to march towards the country of 
the insurgents, into which he penetrated a considerable dis- 



PROLEGOMENA, CXVii 

tance. There were several limites, or wooden causeways, 
through the forests and marshes, running from the Rhine as 
far as the river Lippe, and through Westphalia, to the river 
Weser. These roads were similar to the one between St. 
Petersburg and Novgorod, and Moscow. Varus was led 
by the conspirators to abandon these straight roads, and as 
he ventured deeper into the country, the revolt became gene= 
ral, and the Romans found themselves outwitted. Varus 
tried to retreat and reach the causeway, probably with a 
view of defending himself in the fortress of Aliso on the Lippe. 

The question about the exact spot where the battle of 
Varus was fought, is one of those which, in my opinion, can 
never be satisfactorily answered. The only sensible and prac- 
tical mode of investigating the matter, would be to examine 
from what point a Roman road may have been made into 
the country of the Germans, and I imagine that Cologne was 
a convenient point to start from, but the difficulties were 
pretty nearly the same everywhere. It is infinitely more 
difficult to determine anything upon this point, than to trace 
Hannibal's passage over the Alps. 

On the first day, Varus was attacked on all sides, and at 
once lost a great part of his baggage. It was with the 
greatest difficulty that he formed a camp for the night, and 
fortified himself. On the following day, he was pressed still 
harder, but he continued his march. The terror and con- 
fusion in his columns were so great, that in the evening, when 
they were about to pitch their camp, the soldiers could 
hardly resist the attack. Varus was at last quite overcome 
by the consciousness of his hopeless situation and his respon- 
sibility ; and he had several of his officers put an end to their 
lives. It was probably at that moment that Numonius Vala 
(apparently the person to whom Horace addressed his epistle) 
separated the cavalry from the infantry, and endeavoured, but 
unsuccessfully, to escape with his three squadrons alone. They 
too were overwhelmed, just as they deserved to be, for 
having abandoned their companions. On the third clay, the 
whole of the Roman army was annihilated, only a few escap- 
ing with their lives. The Germans took awful vengeance 
upon their oppressors : many of the Roman prisoners were 



CXV111 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

sacrificed to the gods of the Germans, who offered human 
sacrifices for the purpose of ascertaining the future. Three 
legions, with as many alae, and ten cohorts, were cut to 
pieces ; but, owing to the unfortunate divisions among the 
Germans, they were unable to make that use of their victory 
which Arminius would otherwise have undoubtedly have 
made. Many of the Roman castella, however, were taken 
and destroyed ; and much else may have been done, which 
the Roman accounts of this catastrophe passed over in 
silence.* 

§ XXI. STRABO's NOTICE OF GERMANY. 

The details in Strabo are fewer than we expect. 

They are also those of a Greek ; and it must be remem- 
bered that it was only through the Romans that the Greeks 
knew much of Germany ; in other words, their knowledge 
was second-hand. 

Hence, the distinction between a Gaul and a German, so 
clear to a Roman, was far from being equally clear to a Greek. 
This remark has been made by Grimm, but without being 
acted on. Yet the practical bearing of it is important. 

Even such a writer as Caesar does not wholly confine his 
account of Germany to what he had himself observed. On 
the contrary, he quotes Eratosthenes, and indicates the 
opinions of other Greeks. Pliny's account is pre-eminently 
Greek, whilst Tacitus has evidently, in more places than one, 
allowed his reading to stand in the place of first-hand investi- 
gation. Yet the Greeks were no safe guides ; not because 
they had no powers of observation, but because it was impos- 
sible for them to know such a country as Germany without 
coming in contact with Germans. Sttil they knew something 
of it. They knew that it was the land of a certain stock, 
family, or nation that came under certain negative conditions. 

The German was not a Scythian, in the way that the 
natives of the Don were. 

Nor an Illyrian, as a Taulantian was. 

Nor a Sarmatian, as the Jazyges were. 
* Fuller details for the personal career of Arminius may be found in 
Professor Creasy's Fifteen Decisive Battles of the World. 



PROLEGOMENA. CX1X 

Nor Keltic or Gallic, like a Gaul from the parts about 
Marseilles. 

Nor yet Iberic, like a Spaniard. 

Nevertheless, he was referable to some great class. 

In many cases I believe this class to have been deemed 
German, purely on some such negative trains of reasoning 
as the preceding ; for instance : — I imagine that certain 
differentia, between the Bastarnee on one side, and the Sar- 
matians, Thracians, Galatse, and Ulyrians on the other, made 
them pass as Germans, in the eyes of such inquiring but 
imperfectly informed Greeks, as knew that there was an 
ethnological class called German, without knowing accurately 
what it was. Such a process, mutatis mutandis, is by no 
means uncommon, even in modern investigations. Ethnology, 
even in the hands of Pri chard, has its class called Allopliylian, 
the contents being whatever is, at one and the same time, 
European or Asiatic without being what is called Indo- 
European. 

It is safe, too, to say that the Greeks were such authorities 
in the eyes of a Roman, that, except where their errors were 
palpable, they were rarely contradicted. Something of this 
sort is to be found in the intellectual relations between 
England and Germany at the present moment. How many 
points are there in such a question, as {e.g.) the ethnology of 
British India, where the English inquirer, although trusting 
to himself for particulars lying within the pale of a well- 
known area, puts his faith in some German for the more 
general questions that arise, as well as for those results in 
which book-learning and speculation take a part ? And 
how often is he wrong in doing so ? 

According to this view, both the Greek and the Roman 
evidence respecting Germany fall into two parts : — 
1. The Greeks— 

a. Where they followed the Romans, the only first-hand 
inquirers, are accurate and trustworthy. But then their 
evidence is often either superfluous, or else only confirmatory 
of what we learn from Caesar and Tacitus. 

b. Where their information is not of Roman origin, they are 
indistinct and inaccurate* — indistinct and inaccurate, for the 



CXX THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

same reason that an Englishman is indistinct and inaccurate 
in the geography of Central Africa or the interior of Brazil, 
want of access. 

2. On the other hand, the Romans — 

a. Where they speak from actual knowledge, have no 
occasion to refer to the Greeks. 

b. Where, for want of this, they do so, they follow unsafe 
guides. 

The ethnology to which this applies most especially, is 
that of the Bastarna and Peucini, the Cimbri and Tentones. 
With these preliminaries, we may say of the text of Strabo — 

a. That where he follows the historians of Drusus and 
Tiberius, he is unexceptionable. 

b. That where he follows Posidonius, and such writers 
as could but have written from what they inferred, rather 
than what they knew, he is exceptionable. 

What applies to the text of Strabo, as we find it in Strabo 
himself, applies to those statements in subsequent writers, 
for which he is the authority. 

They give us an observation where his evidence is of 
Roman, and speculation or an inference, where it is of Greek 
origin. 

Observe. — Those proper names which appear in a different 
type (SovGarToi), will be the subject of notice in the sequel. 

STRABO, VII. 

I. Evdvs Tolvvv tcl irepav tov 'Viqvov fiera 7-01)9 KeXrou? 777309 
tt]v k'co fce/cXifieva Tepfiavol vifAOvrai, fjbitcpbv igaWdTTOVTe? 
tov KeXriKov $>vkov, t<*> re TfK.eovaap.h. 7-779 dyp 1 6 it] to 9 ical 
tov fieyeOovs, KaX t?}? ^av6oTr]TO<; • Tak\a$e 7rapa7r\rjcrioi KaX 
fiopcpals, koX tfdeai, koX /3tW oVtc?, oiov? elpr\Kap,ev tov<s 
Ke\Tovs. A16 Sl/catd fxoi Bokovctl 'Pcofialoi tovto avTols 
Qeo~6at Tovvopba, 009 av <yv7]o~lovi Ta\aTa<; <ppd£etv ftov\6- 
fievoi • ryvrjaiot yap ol Tepixavol tcaTa. ttjv 'Pcojxatoiv hid- 

\6KTOV. 

"EcrTt Se to), fiev irpCoTa p>epr\ 7-779 %copa9 TavT7)$ to\ 7t/)09 
t&) e P->]Voj p-eXP c T ^ v ^^wv a-iro 7779 7^77779 dpj;afievoi<; ' 
a^eSbv Be toi KaX tovto €o~ti to ecnrepiov 7779 %a>pa9 



PROLEGOMENA, CXXl 

TrXdros, rj Trora/xia rrdaa. Tavrrjs Be rd fiev et<? rr)v Ke\- 
riKr)v fierrjyayov 'Vcofialoi, rd §' €(}>6r} jieraardvra eis rrjv 
iv fidOei %cbpav, KaQdrtep Mapaoi' Xoirrol 8' elcrlv oXiyoi 
Kal rcov ~2ovyd/ji§pcov fiepos. Merd Be robs irapairorapbiov;, 
t dXXa icrriv eQvr] rd fiera^v rov 'Vrjvov teal rov "AX§io$ 
irorafxov * 09 TrapdXXTjXo^ 7ro)9 itceivqy pet 7rpo? rov Sliceavov, 
ovk iXdrroo yoopav Bie^icov, rJTrep iKeivos. Elcrl Be fiera^v real 
aXXoi irorapbol irXcorol (cov iv ra> A/xaaia Apovcros Bpovtcri- 
pov<? Karevavfid^rjae) peovres oocravrcos dirb vorov 737309 /3o/3- 
pav Kal tov 'Hfceavov. 'E^fjprai yap r) yw>pa 777509 vorov, Kal 
crvve^rj v AXTrecri iroiel pdyiv nvd, 777)09 ea> rerap,evt]V, C09 dv 
/nipo<i ovcrav rcov "AXTrecov • /cal Br) Kal direcfrrjvavTO rives 
ovrcos, Bid re ri)v Xe%6eicrav Qecriv, Kal Bid rb rr)v avrr)v 
v\r)V €K(j)ip€iv ' ov fir)v eirl rocrovrov ye in|ro9 dvlcryei rd 
ravTTjs fjuepy). 'EvravQa S' icrrl Kal 6 'EpKvvios Bpvpbs, Kal 
rd rcov lorjffcov eQvr], rd puev oiKovvra ivrbs rov Bpvfiov, 
Kaddirov rd rcov KoXBovcov iv ols icrn Kal rb Bovtaifiov, 
to rov MapoSovBov fiacriXeiov, eh bv iKelvos rbrrov, dXXovs 
re /xeravecrrr/cre irXelovs, Kal Br) tou9 bfxoeQvels eavrco Map- 
KOfj,p,dvov<5. ^Errearr] yap roh rrpdypbacriv ovros e£ IBioorov, 
fierd rr)v e/c 'Ycofirjq iirdvoBov • veo<i yap r)v ivQdBe, koI 
evepyereiro vrrb rov 2,e£aaTov • iiraveXQoov Be iBvvdcrrevcre 
Kal KareKrrjcraro, 7rpo9 049 elirov, Aoviovs re, /xeya eQvo<;, 
Kal Zovfjbovs, Kal Bovrovas, Kal MovyiXcovas, Kal 2i§ivov<;> 
Kal, rb rcov 2cj;(dW avrcov fxeya eOvos, li/xv novas. UXr)v 
rd ye rcov 2o?;(dW, &>9 e<f)r)v, eQvr], rd fiev ivrbs <pKei, rd Be 
6/CT09 rov Bpvp,ov, ofjiopa T049 Yerais. Meyiarov fiev rb 
rcov SorjScov e6vos - BirjKei yap drrb rov 'Fijvov pe^pi rov 
"AA,^to9 ' fiepos Be ri avrcov, Kal rrepav rov A\§io<; ve/jberai, 
KaOdirep 'Ep/xovSopoi Kal AayKoaapyoi' vvv Be Kal reXecoq 
et9 tt)v irepalav ovrol ye e kit ervrcoK aai $>evyovre<$. Koivbv 
8' icrriv arracn T0i9 ravry, rb rrepl rd<? fjieravacrrdo-eiq 
ev/jiape<i, Bid rr)v XirorTjra rov fiiov, Kal Bid rb fir) yecopyeiv, 
fiijBe Srjaavpl^eiv, dXX iv KaXv£ioi<s oiKelv icprjfiepov eyovsri 
TrapaaKevrjv rpocpr) 8' dirb rcov Spef.i/xdrcov r) TrXeiart], 
Kaddrrov rol<; ~Nofido~iv • cocrr e/ceiVoi/9 fiifiovfievoi, rd oiKela, 
ral<i dpfxa/xd^ai^ iirapavre^, biroi dv Bo^tj, rperrovrai fierd 
rcov ^ocrKTj/xdrcov. 'AXXa §' ivBeearepd icrriv eQvr] Tep/xa- 



CXXli THE GERMANY OF TACITUS- 

viKa, Xi)povaKol re teal X.drroc, /ecu Tap,a§piovioi, Kal Xar 
rovdpioi' 7rpo? he ray'QKeavai lovyafjugpoi re, Kal Xai)8oi, 
Kal BpovKrepoi, Kal Ki/jigpoi, KavKol re Kal KaovXKOi, Kal 
Kapyjriavol, Kal aXXoi rrXelow;. 'Errl ravra he tg5 Ap,ao-la 
cpepovrai, Blaovpyis re, Kal Aovrrias rrorafib*;, hie^cov 
'Vi]vov rrepl e^a/cocrtW? arahlovs, pecov hid BpovKrepcov roiv 
eXarrovcov. "Eari he Kal 2dXas rrorafib^, ov /xera^i) Kal 
rov 'V/jvov rroXe/xoJv, Kal KaropQwv Apovao? ereXevrijaev o 
TepfiavLKO^. ^E^etpcoaaro 8' ov \ibvov rcov edvcov rd rrXelara, 
dXXd Kal Ta? eV rw rrapdrrXoi vt]aovs, wv earl Kal r) Bovp^a- 
vi?, i)v eK TrdXiopKLas elXe. 

Evoopifxa he ravra Karearrj rd edvr], rroXefjuovvra rrpos 
'Voofialovq, elr evhthovra, Kal rrdXiv d(pio-rd/u,eva, r) Kau 
KaraXetrrovra rd<; KaroiKias • KavrrXelw he yvoopep^a vrryp^ev, 
el errerperre rocs o~rparri<yot$ 6 ^e£acrrb<;,hca£aiv€iv tov'AXSlv, 
jjuerLOvcri to 1)5 eKelae erravLo-rapLevovs. Nvvl h evrropoorepov 
vrreXa/3e arpart]<yetv rbv ev %epcrl rroXe/iov, el rwv e^oj rov 
"AXfiio? Ka6* rjav^iav bvrcov drre^oLro, Kal ///>/ rrapo^vvot, 777309 
ri)v Koivoiviav t?}9 e^Opa?. "Hp^avro he rov rroXepbov 2ou- 
rya/xfipoi ttXtjctlov oiKovvres rov 'Vrjvov, MeXcova e^ovre^ 
>)yep,bva • KciKelSev 77S77 hiel^ov aXXor aXXoi, hvvaarevovres 
Kal KaraXvb/xevoc, rrdXiv 8' d<pto-rdp,evoi, rrpohihovre? Kal 
rd bfAT)pa Kal rd$ rrlarei^. ETpo? ovs rj fxev dmarla, /meya 
6(peXo$ ' ol he rnarevOevres, rd /miyiara Kare^Xa-^rav, 
KaOdirep ol XrjpovaKOL, Kal 01 rovrcov virrjKOOi' Trap ol? rd 
rpia rdy/xara '¥a)p,ata>v puerd rov crrparrjyov Ovdpov Koviv- 
nXlov Trapaa7rovhi]0evra, drrcoXero e'f ivehpa?. "Ercaav he 
BiKas arravres, Kal rrapeo-yov rw vetorepoo Tep/xaviKO) 
Xafjirrpbrarov QpiapiSov, ev a> e6piapL§ev9r] rcov errKpaveard- 
rwv dvhpcov aoopuara Kal yvvatKOiv, Sefiiyovvrb*; re Seyecrrov 
vlbs, XrjpovaKoov rjyepboov, Kal dheXcpr) avrov, <yvvr] 8' Ap- 
fievlov, rov rroXefiap^aavro^ ev rol$ X.7]povo~Kot<; ev rfj 
7rpo? Ovapov KovivrlXiov rrapao-rrovhrjcrei, Kal vvv ert crvve- 
%ovros rbv rrbXe/xov, 6vop,a OovcrveXha, Kal i/to? rpterrjs 
Qov/xeXiKos ' ert he SealdaKos 1,ai<yi/jLr}pov ui'09 twv X.epov- 
aKU>v fyyefAOVOs, Kal rj yvvrj rovrov 'Pa/u?, OvKpofivpov Qvyd- 
T VP> i?7e/xovo? Bottwv, Kal Aevhopit; Bairopcros rov Me\<w- 
^09 dheXcpov vlb<$ 1 l ovya/A§po<;. 2<wyecrT?7? he 6 rrevOepb 1 ; rov 



PROLEGOMENA. cxxili 

Appteviov teal e'£ dp^r)^ htearrj 7rpo? rr)v yvcopuijv avrov, Kal 
Xaficov /ccupbv rjvrofjboXrjae, Kal tw QpidptScp rrapr)v rcov 
cpiXrdrcov, ev rififj dyopuevos • eTropbrrevae 8e Kal Ai{3r)<; rcov 
Xdrrcov lepevs, Kal dXXa 8e acapuara e7rop,7rev6r/ e/c rcov 
ireiropOrijjLevav iOvcov, KaOvXKcov Kal Aputydvcov, BpovKre- 
pcov, N o v cr I it co v, X.r/povaKcov, Xdrrcov, Xarrovaplcov, Aav- 
Scbv, *2,ovj3arrlcov. Aoe^ei 8e rov 'AA-/3to? 6 'Prjvo? ire pi 
rpta-^Cklov^ araSlov^, el rt? evOvrropovaas €%ei ra? 68ov<i' 
vvvi 8e Sui crKoXias Kal eXcbSovs, Kal 8pvpicbv, KVKXoiropeiv 
dvdjKT]. 

r O 8e 'EpKvvto<i 8pvpbbs irvKVorepos re earl, Kal pteyaXo- 
8ev8po$ ev ^coploi<; epvfivols, kvkXov irepiXapb^dvcov pteyav 
ev fieaco 8e Xhpvrat ycopa KaXcbs olKelcrdat hwaptevr], rrepl 77? 
elprjKapbev. "Eart Se ttXtjctIov avrrjs rj re rov "Icrrpov 7717777, 
Kal r) rov 'Prjvov, Kal r) ptera^v dpicpolv Xlptvrj, Kal rd eXrj rd 
€K rov 'Prjvov 8ia%eopLeva. "Ecrrt 8' r) Xlpuvrj rr)v puev rrepl- 
puerpov ara8lcov irXeibvcov rj r , 8lappua he eyyi)<; a . "E^et 8e 
Kal vtjctov, y e^pr^craro bppbijrriplcp Ti@epios vavpuaycav 7rpo? 
OvlvheXiKovs- NoTicoripa S' iarl rcov rov"Iarpov rrrjycov Kal 
avrrj, Kal 6 'EpKvvios Spvp,b$, coar dvdyKrj rco eV rr)<q KeXrtKr)^ 
errl rov 'EpKvvtov 8pvpbbv lovri, rrpcorov ptev Siawepdaai rr)v 
Xlpbvrjv, erretra rov v larpov, elr rjhrj 81 evirerearepcov yoapicov 
errl rov 8pup,bv ra? 7rpo€daec<i 7rote?cr6ai 81 opoirehtcov. 
'Hptepijcriov Se dirb rr)<i XlpLvr/s irpoeXOcov 68bv TtSepoos, el8e 
ra<? rov "Icrrpov rrrjyds. Ylpoadrrrovrat 8e rr)$ Xlpuvrj^ eir 
oXtjov puev ol 'Patrol, rb 8e 7rXeov 'EXovrjrnoi Kal Oviv8eXi- 
koI, Kal r) Botcov epr}p,ia. Me%pc Ylavvovlcov irdvre^, rb 
rrXeov 8' 'EXovrjrrioL Kal Oviv8eXiKol otKovaiv 6po7re8ca. 
'Patrol 8e Kal NoypiKol pte^pi rcov AXiretcov virepSoXcov 
dvicryovcTi, Kal irpb<i rr)v 'IraXlav rrepivevovctv, ol ptev 'Ij/- 
o-ov§poi<; crvvdrrrovres, ol 8e Kdpvocs, /cal 7-049 rrepl rr)v 
'AKvXrjtav ^copious. "Eort 8e Kal ctXXrj vXrj ptejdXr/ TaGprjra' 
erreira 8e rd rcov SorjScov • eireKetva 8' 6 'EpKvvws 8pvpu6<; • 
eyerai 8e KaKelvos vir avrcov. 

II. Wepl 8e KlptSpcov rd puev ovk ev Xeyerai, rd S' e%ee 
7ri6av6rrjra<; ov pberpias. Oi/re yap rr)v roiavrr/v air lav rov 
rrXdvrjra<i yevecrdat Kal Xr/arpLK0V<i dirohe^air dv ris, on, 
^eppovrjcrov olKovvres, pueydXrj TrXrjp,p,vpl8i i^eXacrdeiev e'/c 



CXX1V THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

rcov rbrrcov ' zeal yap vvv eyovcri ttjv yo*pav, fjv ei^ov rrpo- 
repov, Kal eire/n^av tm 2e aarco Bcopov, rbv lepcorarov Trap 
avTOt? XeSr/ra, airov/xevoi cf>iXiav, Kal dpivqcrrlav rcov inr- 
7jp<yp,evcov ' rv^ovres Be, cov r)%iovv, airfipav ' jeXolov Be rco 
(pvcrtKco, Kal alcovlco rrdOei, Bis eKtiarris i)p,epa<; avp,GaivovTi, 
Trapopyitrdevras drreXOelv e/c rov tottov. "Eot/ce Be rrXd- 
a/iari, rb avp&rjvai rrore TrXij/xfivplBa v7rep€dXXovcrav irrt- 
rdaea fiev yap Kal dveaecs Several reray/nevas Se Kal ire- 
ptoBifyvaas 6 'Q-Keavbs ev rots roiovrois rrdOeaiv. Ovk ev 
£' ovft 6 cp/jaas brrXa alpeadai rrpbs rds rrXijp/jbvpiBas robs 
Ki/iGpovs, ovS' brt dcpoSiav ol KeXrol daKovvres, Kara- 
Kkvi^eaOat rds oUtas vrrofievovaiv, elr dvotBofiovai, Kal ort 
rrXelcov avrois trvp-Qalvei (pdopos i£ vBaros, rj nroXefiov, orrep 
"E^)opo9 cpr/trLv. C H <ydp rd^is r) rcov 7rXrj/jt,fjbvplBcov, Kal to 
ttjv e7rtK\v^o/j,evT]v ^copav elvai yvcbpifxov, ovk epeXXe ravras 
rds drorrias irape^ew. A19 yap eKaarr]s r)p,epas tovtov 
avfi^alvovros, rb /xtjo" cnra% aladdvecrdai <pvaiKi)v ovaav ri)v 
rraXlppotav Kal d£Xa£f}, Kal ov p,6vois tovtols crvfx^aivovaav, 
dXXci tols rrapcoKeav irais iracn, rrcos ovk dirldavov ; OvBe 
KXelrap^os ev ' cpricrl <ydp rovs linreas IBovras rr/v ecpoBov 
rov rreXdyovs dcpnrTrdaao-dai, Kal cpevyovras €77119 yeveaOav 
rov 7r€piKara\r}cp87]vat,. Ovre Be roaovrco rdyei rr)v errl- 
§acriv 6pco/j,ev7]v Icnopovfjcev, dXXd XeXrjdorcos irpocnovcrav 
rr/v QdXarrav • ovre rb KaO^ r)txepav yuyvo/xevov Kal irdcriv 
evavXov yBrj ov rots TrXrjatd^etv fxeXXovcrt, rrplv r) Sedaaadat, 
roaovrov e/jteXXe irape^ecrdat cpoSov, ware cpevyetv, a>9 av ei 
ii; dBoK7]rov 7rpoae7reae. 

Tavra Be SiKalco<; eirLrtpba Tot9 crvyypacfievcn TIoaeiBcbvios, 
Kal ov KaKcos et/ca^et, on XrjarpLKol 6vre<i Kal rrKdvqre^ ol 
Klfx&poi, Kal ^XP L T ™ v rrre P l T V V Maitoriv rroi-qaaivro crrpa- 
Teiav ' drr eKelvcov Be Kal 6 Ktiiyu,ept09 KXrjdelr) /3ocr7ro/)09, 
olov Kiyu.§pt/co9, KifJbp,eplov<i robs Kl/x£pov<; 6vop,aadvrcov rcov 
'E\\i']vcov. <t>i]crl Be Kal Boi'ovs rbv 'RpKvviov 8pvp,bv oiKelv 
rrporepov ' TOU9 Se KifiSpovs 6p/j,rjaavra<; eirl rbv rbirov 
rovrov, diroKpovcrBevras virb rcov Botcov errl rbv "larpov, Kal 
rovs ^KopBlaKov; TaXdras KaraSrjvai • elr errl Tavpiard^ 
Kal TavpLtTKovs, Kal rovrov^ TaXdras • elr eirl 'EXovTjrriov;, 
TroXvxpvaovs p,ev avBpas, eipr)vaiov$ Be- bpcovras Be rbv eV 



PROLEGOMENA. CXXV 

rcov Xrjarrjplcov ifKovrov, virepSdWovra rov rvap eavrol?, 
rov? 'EXovrjrrtov? eirapdrjvai, fidXiara S' avrcov Tiyvprjvov? 
re ical Tcovyevov?, coare ical avve^op/xr)aai. Havre? p,ev rot 
/care\v0rjaav virb rcov 'Pco/xalcov, avrol re ol Kl/i§oi, ical ol 
avvapdfievoc rovrot?, ol fjuev v7rep§dX\ovre? rd? , A\7rei,? els 
rrjv ^\ra\lav, ol §' e^co rcov AXirecov. 

"Edo? 8e n rcov Kl/A^pcov Sirjyovvrat roiovrov, on rats 
yvvai^lv avrcov avarparevovaat?, rraprjKo'Xovdovv rrpofjidv- 
ret? lepecat r Tro\i6rpi%es, \evj(e Ifiove?, Kaprraaiva? ecpairrlha? 
emrrerroprrrnikvai, ^ayapua ^aXicovv eyovaai, yvp,vbivo8e?' 
rol? ovv al^puaXcoroi? Sea rod arparoireSov avvtfvrcov ^ccprj- 
pei? • Karaareyjraaac S' avroi)? rjyov iirl /cparrjpa j/a\icovv 
oaov dpucjyopecov e'lKoat' el%ov Se ava§d9pav, r)v dva&daa 
vireprrerr)? rov \eSrjro? ekaipborofxeL eicaarov puerecopiadevra' 
etc 8e rov 7rpo%eopLevov ai/xaro? el? rov Kparrjpa, /navrelav nvd 
eiroiovvro ' aXkai Se 8iaa%laaaai, eaTikdy^yevov dvacpOey- 
yopuevai vl/crjv rol? oliceloi?. 'Ev 8e roc? dycoatv ervirrov rd? 
fivpaa? rd? irepirera/jbeva? rol? yeppoi? rcov dpfia/Aagcov, war 
diroreXela^at tyocpov e^alaiov. 

Tcov 8e Teppuavcov, co? elirov, ol fiev rrpoadpicrLoi irapr]- 
Kovat rco 'H/ceavco. Tvcopl^ovrai 8' dirb rcov e/c8o\cbv rov 
'Vrjvov XaSovre? rr)v dp^rjv, fiixpi T °v "AXSto?. Tovrcov S' 
elal yvcopipicoraroi, 2,ovyap.§pol re ical KlfiSpoi. Td 8e 
irepav rov "A\§i,o?, rd irpb? rco 'Q/ceavcu, iravrairaaLV dyvco- 
ara rj/xlv eariv. Otire yap rcov rrporepcov ovSeva? ta/xev rov 
rrapdifKovv rovrov rreiroirj^kvov? rrpb? rd ecodevd p*epr), 
rd p*e%pi rov aropbaro? rrj? Kaairla? QaXdrrrj?, oi/(9' ol 
'Vcopualoi TrporfkOov irco el? rd irepatrepco rov A\§io? • co? S' 
avrco? ov8e rre^ol irapcohevicaaiv ovSive?. 'AW' ore fiev 
/card purjtco? lovaiv errl rrjv eco, rd Kara rov Bopvaflevrj ical 
rd irpb? fioppdv fieprj rov Ylovrov yjopia diravra, 8r)\ov etc 
rcov /cXipidrcov ical rcov irapaWrj\cov Staarrjfidrcov. Tt S' 
earl irepav rr)? Tepfiavla?, ical ri rcov aXXcov rcov e£f)?, e'lre 
Baardpva? yjpr) Xeyeiv, co? ol 7r\etov? virovoovatv, elr 
aXkov? fiera^v, r) '\dQjya?, i) 'Pco^o\dvov?, r\ riva? aWov? 
rcov Afj,a%ol/ccov, ov paScov eliretv ouS' el /xe^pt rov 'Qiceavov 
7rap7jK0vai irapdirav rb p,r)/co?, el earl re dol/crjrov vrrb ■fyvyov?, 
r) aXkij? alrla?, r) el ical yevo? dvOpcoircov aXXo StaSe^erat 



CXXvi THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

fiera^v rf/9 SaXaTTt] 1 ; ical tcov kaxov Tep/xavtov i&pvfievov 
Tovro Se to avro dyvo^fia ical irepl tcov aWcov rwv i<pe£r/<i 
irpoaapKTiwv eXeyev. Oure yap rovs BcurTapvas, ovre tov? 
lav po par as, ical airkw*; tov$ virep tov YIovtov OLKovvras 
Xcrfiev, ov6' ottoctov (nrkypvtri 7-779 \r\avTLKrj<i 3a\dTTr)<;, ovt 
el avvdiTTOvaiV iv avTrj. 



§ XXII. NOTICE OF GERMANY FROM POMPONIUS MELA, 111. 

II. Rhenus, ab Alpibus decidens, prope a capite duos lacus 
efficit, Venetum et Acronium. Mox diu solidus, et certo 
alveo lapsus, haud procul a mari hue et illuc dispergitur ; sed 
ad sinistram amnis etiam turn, et donee effluat, Rhenus; ad 
dextram primo angustus et sui similis, post ripis longe ac 
late recendentibus, jam non amnis sed ingens lacus, ubi cam- 
pos implevit, Flevo dicitur : ejusdemque nominis insulam 
amplexus, fit iterum arctior, iterumque fluvlus emittitur. 

III. Germania hinc ripis ejus usque ad Alpes, a meridie 
ipsis Alpibus, ab oriente Sarmaticarum confinio gentium, qua 
septentrionem spectat, oceanico litore obducta est. Qui 
habitant, immanes sunt animis atque corporibus, et ad insitam 
feritatem vaste utraque exercent, bellando animos, corpora ad 
consuetudinem laborum, maxime frigoris. Nudi agunt, ante- 
quum puberes sint ; et longissima apud eos pueritia est : viri 
sagis velantur, aut libris arborum, quamvis sa3va hieme. 
Nandi non patientia tantura illis, studium etiam est. Bella 
cum finitimis gerunt : causas eorum ex libidine arcessunt ; 
neque imperitandi prolatandique, quae possident (nam ne ilia 
quidem enixe colunt), sed ut, circa ipsos quse jacent, vasta 
sint. Jus in viribus habent, adeo ut ne latrocinii quidem 
pudeat ; tantum hospitibus boni, mitesque supplicibus : victu 
ita asperi incultique, ut cruda etiam carne vescantur, aut 
recenti, aut cum rigentem in ipsis pecudum ferarumque 
coriis, manibus pedibusque subigendo, renovarunt. Terra 
ipsa multis impedita fluminibus, multis montibus aspera, et 
magna ex parte silvis ac paludibus invia. Paludum, Suesia, 
Estia, et Melsiagum, maxima? : silvarum, Hercynia, et aliquot 
sunt, quae nomen habent : sed ilia dierum sexaginta iter oc- 
cupans, ut major aliis, ita et notior. Montium altissimi 



PROLEGOMENA. CXXVil 

Taunus et Rhetico ; nisi quorum nomina vix est eloqui ore 
Eomano. Amnium in alias gentes exeuntium, Danubius et 
Rhodanus ; in Rhenum, Moenis et Lupia ; in Oceanum, 
Amisius, Visurgis et Albis clarissimi. Super Albim Oodanus 
ingens sinus magnis parvisque insulis refertus est. Hac re 
mare, quod gremio litorum accipitur, nusquam late patet, nee 
usquam mari simile, verum, aquis passim interfluentibus ac 
ssepe transgressis, vagum atque diftusum, facie amnium, spar- 
gitur : qua litora attingit, ripis contentum insularum non 
longe distantibus, et ubique paene tantundem, it angustum et 
par freto ; curvansque se subinde, longo supercilio inflexum 
est. In eo sunt Cimbri et Teutoni : ultra, ultimi Germanise 
Hermiones. 



§ XXIII. PLINY S NOTICE OF GERMANY. 

Pliny's account of Germany is much more Greek, and much 
less Latin, than we are prepared to expect from an author 
writing in the language of Caesar, and subsequent to him. 

NAT. HIST. IV. 

XXVII. Incipit inde clarior aperiri fama ab gente Ingae- 
vonum, quae est prima inde Germanise. Sevo mons ibi im- 
mensus, nee Riphaeis jugis minor, immanem ad Cimbrorum 
usque promontorium efficit sinum, qui Codanus vocatur, re- 
fertus insulis: quarum clarissima Scandinavia est, incompertse 
magnitudinis, portionem tantum ejus, quod sit notum, Hillevi- 
onum gente r». incolente pagis, quae alteram orbem terrarum 
earn appellat. Nee est minor opinione Eningia. Quidam 
haec habitari ad Vistulam usque fluvium a Sarmatis, Venedis, 
Sciris, Hirris tradunt. Sinum Oylipenum vocari : et in 
ostio ejus insulam Latrin. Mox alteram sinum Lagnum, 
conterminum Cimbris. Promontorium Cimbrorum excurrens 
in maria longe peninsulam efficit, quae Cartris appellatur. 
Tres et viginti inde insulae Romanorum armis cognitae. 
Earum nobilissimae, Burchana, Fabaria nostris dicta, a frugis 
similitudine sponte provenientis. Item Glessaria, a succino 
militiae appellata : a barbaris Austrania, praeterque Actania. 

XXVIII. Toto autem hoc mari ad Scaldim usque fluvium, 



CXXV111 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

Germanicse accolunt gentes hand explieabili mensura : tarn 
immodica prodentium discordia est. Groeci et quidam nostri, 
vicies quinquies centena millia passuum oram Germanise tra- 
diderunt. Agrippa cum Rha?tia et Norico longitudinem 
dclxxxxvi. millia passuum, latitudinem cxlviii. M. Rhsetiae 
prope unius majore latitudine, saue circa excessum ejus 
subactse. Nam Germania multis postea annis, nee tota, 
percognita est. Si conjectare permittitur, haud multum orse 
deerit Grsecorum opinione, et longitudini ab Agrippa proditse. 
Germanorum genera quinque : Vindili ; quorum pars Bur- 
gundiones : Varini, Carini, Guttones. Alterum genus, Inga> 
vones ; quorum pars Cimbri, Teutoni, ac Chaucorum gentes. 
Proximi autem Rheno Istcevones ; quorum pars Cimbri medi- 
terranei : Hermiones ; quorum Suevi, Hermunduri, Cliatti, 
Cherusci. Quinta pars Peucini, Basternrc, supradictis con- 
termini Dacis. Annies clari in Oceanum defluunt, Guttalus, 
Vistillus sive Vistula, A Ibis, Yisurgis, Amisius, Rhenus, 
Mosa. Introrsus vero, nullo inferius nobilitate, Hercynium 
jugum prsetenditur. 

XXIX. In Rheno ipso, prope centum m. pass, in longi- 
tudinem, nobilissima Batavorum insula, et Cannenifatum : et 
alia? Frisiorum, Chaucorum, Frisiabonum, Sturiorum, Mar- 
saciorum, quae sternuntur inter Helium ac Flevum. Ita 
appellantur ostia, in qua? effusus Rhenus, ab septemtrione in 
lacus, ab occidente in amnem Mosam se spargit : medio inter 
hsec ore, modicum nomini suo custodiens alveum. 

The next author in point of time is Tacitus himself. 



C. CORNELII TACITI 

DE SITU, MORXBUS, 

ET POPULIS GERMANISE 

LIBELLUS. 



§ I. Germania 1 Omnis 2 a Gallis 3 Rhsetisque 4 et Pan- 
noniis, 5 Rheno 6 et Danubio 7 fluminibus, 8 a Sarmatis 9 
Dacisque, 10 mutuo metu aut montibus 11 separatur. Ce- 
tera Oceanus ambit, latos sinus et insularum immensa 
spatia complectens, nuper cognitis quibusdam gentibus, 
ac regibus, quos bellum aperuit. Rhenus Rhseticarura 
Alpium 12 inaccesso ac prsecipiti vertice ortus, modico 
flexu in Occidentem versus, septemtrionali Oceano 
miscetur. Danubius, molli et clem enter edito montis 
AbnobaB 13 jugo effusus, plures populos 14 adit, donee in 
Ponticum mare sex meatibus erumpat : septimum 
enim os paludibus hauritur. 

NOTES ON SECTION I. 

1 Germania.] — Tlie English word Germany is the translation of 
the Latin word Germania. 

A truism so evident, apparently, requires no pointing out ; 
nevertheless, the series of considerations to which it gives rise are 
of importance. 

In the first place, Germany is not the name by which the German 
designates his own country. He calls himself Deutsche, and his 
country Deutsch-land. 



^ THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

Neither is it the name hy which a Frenchman designates Germany. 
He calls it Allemagne. 

Whence the difference ? The different languages take the dif- 
ferent names for one and the same country from different sources. 

The German term Deutsch is an adjective ; the earlier form of the 
word being dhitisc. Here the -isc is the same as the -ish in words 
like self-ish. Dint, on the other hand, means people, or nation. 
Hence, dmt-isc is to diut, as j^opularis is to p>opidus. This adjective 
was first applied to the language; and served to distinguish the 
popular, national, native, or vulgar tongue of the populations to 
which it belonged from the Latin. It first appears in documents of 
the ninth century, " Ut quilibet episcopus homilias aperte trans- 
fers studeat in rusticam Romanain linguam aut theotiscam, quo 
tandem cuncti possint intelligere qua? dicantur." — Synodus Tu- 
ronensis, a.d. 813. 

As to the different forms in which either the root or the adjective 
appears, the most important of them are as follows : — 

1. In Mceso-Gothic, ^iudishd = idviKus — Galatians ii. 14 j a 
form which implies the substantive ]>iuda=tdvoQ. 

2. In Old High German, diot=populus, gives the adjective diut- 
■isc=popul-aris. 

3. In Anglo-Saxon we have \eod and \eodisc. 

Sometimes this adjective means heathen; in which case it applies 
to religion and is opposed to Christian. 

Oftener it means intelligible, or vernacidar, and applies to lan- 
guage; in which case it is opposed to Latin. 

The particular Gothic dialect to which it was first applied, was 
the German of the Middle Rhine. Here the forms are various : — 
theodisca, thiudisca, theudisca, teudisca, teutisca. When we reach 
parts less in contact with the Latin language of Rome, its use is 
rarer. Even the Germans of the Rhine frequently use the equi- 
valent term Alemannic, and Francic ; whilst the Saxons and 
Scandinavians never seem to have recognized the word at all. 

Hence it is only the Germans of Germany that are Theot-isci, or 
Deutsche. 

We of England, on the other hand, apply it only to the Dut-ch of 
Holland. 

Hitherto the term is, to a certain degree, one of disparagement ; 
meaning non-Roman, or vulgar. It soon, however, changes its 
character ; and in an Old High German gloss — uncadiuti (ungideuti) 



NOTES ON SECTION I. 3 

=un-Dutch is explained by barbarus. All that is not German, has 
now become in the eyes of the Deutsche, what all that was other than 
Roman was before. The standard has changed. Barbarism is 
measured by its departure from what is Dut-sch ; in other words, 
the term has become so little derogatory as to have become national. 
Nevertheless, originally Deutsche=viUgares. 

From the two facts of Germania being no native name, and Deut- 
sche being one of late origin, we arrive at an inference of great prac- 
tical importance in ethnological criticism, viz., that, although the 
Romans and the Gauls knew the populations beyond the Rhine by 
a common collective term, no such common collective term seems to 
have been used by the Germans themselves. They had none. Each 
tribe had its own designation ; or, at most, each kingdom or con- 
federation. Only when the question as to what was common to 
the whole country, in opposition to what was Roman or Gallic, 
became a great practical fact, did a general ethnological term arise ; 
and this was not German, but Dutch. 

This is a common phenomenon. In Hindostan we hear of the 
wilder mountaineers of Orissa and the Mahratta country under the 
names of K61 and Khond ; and this is a collective term. But it is 
only this in the mouth of a Hindu, or Englishman. Amongst 
themselves the separate names of the different tribes is all that 
is current. 

From this it follows that, Germania being a wow-Germanic term, 
its claims to absolute ethnological accuracy are reduced. It is like 
the term Gallia ; which was so far from containing nothing but Gallic 
Kelts (or, changing the expression, Keltic Gauls), that it included the 
Iberic populations of Aquitania, which were as unlike the true Gaul 
as a Basque of the Pyrenees is unlike a Welshman. Hence, when- 
ever we are disposed to doubt whether so valuable a writer as 
Tacitus could have committed the error of making any particular 
moK-Germanic tribe German, we must remember that so well-in- 
formed an observer as Caesar makes the Aquitani, Gallic. 

It is also important to remember that, like high as opposed to 
low, rich to poor, &c, the word Deut-sch was originally a corre- 
lative term, i.e., it denoted something which was popular, vulgar, 
national, unlearned, to something which was not. Hence, it could 
have had no existence until the relations between the learned and 
lettered language of Rome, and the comparatively unlearned and 
unlettered vidgar tongue of the Franks and Alemanni had developed 

b 2 



4 THE GERMAN Y OF TACITUS. 

some notable points of contrast. Deutsche as a name for Germans, 
in the sense in which it occurs in the ninth century, was an impos- 
sibility in the first, or second. This is not sufficiently considered. 
Many believe that the Teut-, in Teut-ones, is the deut-, in deut-sch. 
To be this exactly is impossible. Any German tribe that called 
itself ]>euda, Diot, or Deoft in the first century must have given a 
different meaning to the word ; and, so doing, have called them- 
selves homines, heroes, or by some term equally complimentary ; — 
certainly not by any word meaning speakers of the vidgar tongue. 

This is to prepare the reader for some further criticism, which 
will occur in the sequel. 

Allemagne and Lamagna arc merely modernized forms of the 
name of a particular section of the Germans, the Alemanni. 

The English name, as already stated, is a translation of the 
Roman one. 

Gemiani, then, is a name given by the Romans to the populations 
who afterwards called themselves DeiUsche ; and Germania is the 
Roman equivalent to Deulschland ; whilst German and Germany are 
English forms of the Roman designation. 

It by no means, however, follows, that because the Romans called 
a certain people by a certain name, that that name was Roman ; 
although reasons have been given* for considering that it is the 
Latin word gerrnani. 

I believe, for my own part, that the word was Keltic ; in other 
words, that whilst the Germans themselves had no collective name 
at all, the Romans called them what they were called by the Gauls. 
The meaning of this Gallic designation is a matter of legitimate 
speculation. At present, it is sufficient to fix the language in which 
the etymology is to be sought. 

The date of the first mention of the name German is more curious 
than important. A distinction, however, connected with the inves- 
tigation of it is necessary. 

The earliest date assigned to an event in German history is one 
thing ; the earliest historian who mentions such an event is another. 
A very early event may be recorded by a very late historian. 

The word semi-Germanis was applied to the nations who, as early 
as the second Carthaginian war, came across Hannibal in his passage 
of the Alps. But, early as this is for the fact itself, the historian 
who records it is late — Livy. 

* See extract from Strabo, Prolegomena. § xxi. 



NOTES ON SECTION I. 5 

The same applies to certain statements concerning the part taken 
by the Bastarnce in the Macedonian war. — See not. in v. Bastarnos. 

In the Fasti Capitolini for B.C. 222, occurs the following- 
entry : M. CLAUDIUS M. F. M. N. MARCELLUS AN. DXXXI. COS. BE GAL- 

LEIS INSUBRIBUS ET g[er]mANIS K. MART. ISQUE SPOLIA OPl(ma) RET- 

tulit duce hostium Ym(domaro ad C'la)sTiT>(ium interfecto). — 
Graav. Thes. Antt. Rom. ii. p. 227. 

This is a notice of some pretension. Polybius, however, calls the 
allies of the Insubrian Gauls not Germans but Gcesatce. 

More than this — the record itself is not above suspicion. The 
part of the stone which contains the letters er, has been repaired, 
and (the extract is from Niebuhr) whether er " was put in at ran- 
dom, or whether it was so on the original stone, I can neither assert 
nor deny. I have often seen the stone, but although a friend of 
mine wished me particularly to ascertain the truth, I was never able 
to convince myself whether the corner containing the syllable is part 
of the original stone or not. It is evident that the name cannot 
have been Cenomanis, since they were allied with the Romans, and 
the g is quite distinct. Gonomani does not occur among the Romans. 
If the author of these Fasti actually wrote Germanis, the nation is 
mentioned. The thing is not at all impossible. At the time of 
Julius Cassar, it is true, the Germans did not live further south than 
the river Maine, driven back by the Gauls. The Germans in the 
Wallis,* of whom Livy (xxi. 38) speaks, were the remnants of an 
earlier German population which had been expelled by the Gauls.' 
— Lecture lviii. Dr. L. Schmitz's edition. 

Of German glosses the words Tlmle, and the different forms of 
the root Est- (see not. in v. JEstyii) are probably the oldest. They 
are referable to the date of the voyage of Pytheas, and must have 
been collected from really Germanic informants. 

Of German authorities Cassar, for all practical purposes, is the 
earliest. 

Of the name Germani, beyond the probable German area, there 
are some remarkable instances. 

a. In Spain we have " Oretani qui et Germani cognominantur." — ■ 
Pliny, iii. 4. 

b. In Persia Von Hammer has traced the name Dzhurman. 
Writers have not been wanting who have connected these names 

with that of the Germani of Germany. I do not say that it cannot 
* These are the supposed Germans of note 3. 



G THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

be done legitimately : at the same time the occurrence of similar 
names, although unlikely to be accidental within a small area, gains 
in probability as the area enlarges. 

2 Omnis — separatur.~\ — Does this mean that within the area 
called Germania there were nothing but Germans? 

Or does it mean that beyond the area called Germania there were 
no Germans ? 

Does it exclude all Gauls, Rhaetians, Pannonians, Sarmatians and 
Dacians from Germany, or does it exclude all Germans from Gaul, 
Rhtetia, Pannonia, Sarmatia, and Dacia? 

Both questions require investigation. 

That there were non-Germanic populations within the Germania 
of Tacitus, probably consisting of Gauls, and certainly consisting of 
Slavonians, Lithuanians, and Finns, is one of the main theorems of 
the present volume ; a theorem for which the reasons may be found 
in notes as well as in the preliminary observations. 

The complementary question as to absence or presence of German 
populations in Gaul, Rhoetia, Pannonia, Sarmatia, and Dacia will 
form part of the subject of tbe next three notes. 

3 Gall/'s.] — Here the question arises as to whether the Gauls formed 
what may be called an ethnological unity : i.e., first, whether the whole 
of the Gallic stock was contained within the area of Gallia ; and, 
secondly, whether that area contained nothing but Gallic populations. 

1. The whole of the Gallic stock was not contained within the 
area of Gaul.— The Britons of England and Wales, the Picts and 
Scots of Scotland, and the numerous tribes of Ireland were all mem- 
bers of the great Gallic stock — a stock also called Keltic. 

2. Populations other than those of the Gallic stock existed in 
Gaul. — Between the Aquitanians to the south and the Gauls to the 
■north of the Loire, there was a greater ethnological difference than 
between the Gauls north of the Loire, and the Britons ; or even the 
Caledonian and Plibernian tribes. The Aquitanians belonged to 
the Iberic stock ; represented at present by the Basques of the 
Pyrenees. The rest were Kelts. 

Such are the general answers to the general question. The parti- 
cular inquiry as to whether there were Germans in Gaul, the inquiry 
indicated in the preceding note, still stands over. 

That there were some Germans in Gaul is undoubted. We can 



NOTES ON SECTION I. 7 

scarcely expect that the Rhine should have been as absolute a fron- 
tier in history as it is in geography. Each nation transgressed it, 
so that there were Gauls in Germany, and Germans in Gaul. 

But comparatively recent migrations — mere changes in the line 
of frontier — are not the matters before us. There are Englishmen 
in India ; but that does not make India English. Was so notable a 
proportion of Gaul occupied by indigenous Germans as to justify us in 
calling Gaul a part of the Germanic area, or the Germans a part of the 
population of Gaul? Were there Germans in Gaul in the same 
way that there were Iberians in the time of Csesar, or Bretons now 1 
Were there Germans in Gaul as there are Welshmen in England 1 

The present writer believes that, in the time of Tacitus, there were 
none such. 

Were there before the time of Tacitus 1 Zeuss and others believe 
that there were. The evidence in favour of these early Gallo-Ger- 
mans consists chiefly, if not exclusively, in an extract from Livy, 
and in the forms of certain words. 

The extract from Livy (forming the external evidence) is as 
follows. Speaking of the passage of Hannibal, he writes, "ea — 
itinera — quae ad Peninum* ferunt, obsepta gentibus semi-Germanis 
fuissent." — xxi. 38. 

The internal evidence, consisting of the real or supposed names of 
the tribes in question, is got at through a considerable amount of 
assumption. Avienus, who is supposed to follow an older autho- 
rity, writes — 

Meat amnis t autem fonte per Tylangios, 
Per Dalitemos, per ChaMlcorum sata, 
Temenicum et agrum (dura sat vocabula 
Auremque primam cuncta vulnerantia ; 
Sed non silenda tibimet ob studium tuum 
Nostramque curam). Panditur porro in decern 
Passus recursu gurgitum stagnum grave. 
Plerique tradunt, inserit semet dehinc 
Vastam in paludem, quern vetus mos Grsecise 
Vocavit Accron. — Ora Maritima, n. 666, &c. 

Now Zeuss, who believes these to be the oldest German names 
extant, and who thinks that they stand for tribes who occupied the 

* This is what Niebuhr calls the Wullis {i.e., the Wales, Welsh, foreign 
or non-German country) in note 1. t The Rhone. 



8 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

Pennine Alps anterior to the Keltic migrations towards Italy, sug- 
gests the following etymologies and parallels. 

«. Tylangii. — The same as the Tulingi of Caesar, with the a 
changed into i, by the Greek authority of Avienus, so that the 
word becomes TvXdyyiot, instead of TvXlyyioi. The -ing (-tyy) is 
the usual German derivational affix, and the Tut-, the root of the 
first part of the compound word TovXlcpovpdoy (a German town 
mentioned by Ptolemy), and til-, a root signifying useful, fit. 

b. Daliterni. — Agreeing in its termination with the words Basteimce, 
and Qnberni, and in its beginning with the root dal=valley, dale. 

c. Chabilci. — The KaovXwu of Strabo, the KaXovKtoveg of Ptolemy 
and the Calucones of Pliny. 

The objections that lie against all this are — 

1. The identity between the tribes named by Avienus and those 
indicated by Livy is not made out. 

2. The tribes with whom the Tylangii and Chabilci are compared 
are not themselves unequivocally Germanic. 

3. Coesar, describing the same locality, calls the population 
Gallic; especially mentioning one of the tribes named by Livy the 

Vi r< "j r't. 

It may fairly be said that all this creates difficulties, and justifies 
the statement that the literal verification of the passage in Livy 
involves a considerable amount of assumption. 

Besides this, in order to reconcile Livy with Crcsar, Zeuss supposed 
an intermixture of Gallic immigrants and German aborigines. This 
introduces greater difficulties than it removes. 

In the first place, the Germans in cjuestion, if aboriginal, were 
disconnected from their nearest congeners by the whole of Helvetia, 
a locality confessedly Gallic. 

Secondly, a mountain-fastness like the Mons Penninus was not 
likely to be a spot from which Gauls would displace Germans. 

No remark has been made upon the etymologies themselves. They 
are derivations which certain readers will be as slow to abandon, as 
others are to admit. Neither is the undoubted Gallic form of the 
word Veragri insisted on ; since, although a Gallic word, it might 
be the designation of a German nation — just as Welsh is in our 
language, a name applied to Welshmen, but not a "Welsh word. 

On the other hand, it may be urged, that the Veragri may have 
been semi-German without Caesar's knowing it, or that Cassar may 
have known them to be semi-Germans without thinking it necessary 



NOTES ON SECTION I. 9 

to call them so- There is no conclusive answer to this objection. 
It is not, however, one which the careful reader of Csesar, unbiassed 
by German predilections, is likely to take. How clearly does he 
recognise the Germanic elements of the character of the Nervii and 
others, and how careful he is to notify them ! 

Surely, it is not too much to say that in Ccesar's time the Pennine 
population was wholly Gallic, and not half-German. 

Now if we do this, Livy's credit must be saved by either supposing 
that he used the word German with a considerable degree of latitude, 
or else that his statement applies to the time he wrote about rather 
than his own. 

I believe the former to have been the case, and answer the ques- 
tion raised in the beginning of the present note, by asserting my 
belief that, as the Tylangii, &c, were wow-Germanic, there were no 
Germans, as integral elements of the population of Gallia, either 
when Tacitus wrote or when Hannibal marched across the Alps. 

4 Bhcetis.] — The countries south of the Danube were first subdued 
under Augustus ; when they were formed into the following pro- 
vinces. 1. Ehsetia. 2. Vindelicia. 3. Noricum. 4. Pannonia Superior. 
5. Pannonia Inferior. 

Ehsetia, the modern Tyrol, was bounded by Helvetia on the west, 
by Vindelicia on the north, aud by Noricum on the east. Prom 
Noricum it was divided by the River Inn (iEnus). 

Vindelicia coincides with the southern half of Bavaria, or that 
portion of Bavaria which lies south of the Danube, and part of 
Wurtemburg. It was bounded on the north-west by the Decumates 
Agri= Baden, and part of Wurtemberg. 

Noricum, the modern Salzburg, and Upper Austria, extended 
from the Inn (iEnus) to the Kahlenberg (Mons Cetius). 

The Pannonias were bounded by the Kahlenberg, the Danube, 
and the Save, and coincide with the south-western part of Hungary, 
and Lower Austria. 

Now of these four names for five provinces, Tacitus mentions only 
two, — Rhsetia and Pannonia. Of Vindelicia and Noricum he says 
nothing, — although each reached to the Danube ; which Rhastia, 
in the strict sense of the word, did not. 

Vindelicia, then, he evidently includes in the area of the Rhseti. 
What, however, he considered Noricum to be, is doubtful. Did he 
count it as part of Pannonia on the east, or as part of Rha3tia on the 



10 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

east, or did he give a part to the one province, and a part to the 
other? 

There is a difficulty hero, which is increased by the fact of the 
Danube forming but partially the Rhasto-Gennanic frontier. A 
considerable portion of the Rhsetia of Tacitus reached the Danube 
as its northern limit, without, therefore, reaching the southern fron- 
tier of Germany. The Decumates Agri lay north of the Danube, 
between Vindelicia, Gaul, and Germany. Yet it is by no means 
certain, that the Decumates Agri were German. — See not. in voc. 

Perhaps a more minute investigation than the present writer has 
bad the opportunity of making, into the early history of the Danubian 
provinces just enumerated, would account for the omission of the 
names Vindelicia and Noricum, and at the same time to inform us 
bow the Norican population was to be distributed. At present, 
however, I consider that Tacitus, in mentioning the Jihceti and 
Pannonii * only, recognized the ethnological rather than the political 
division, and thought of the natural division of an area into its 
nationalities rather than of the artificial distinction of provinces. 

If so, we have an instrument of criticism ; since we may infer that 
the Yindelici were in the same category with the Rhasti, and that 
the Norici were either Rheetian or Pannonian, or else divided be- 
tween the two. 

The ethnological position of the Rhajtians, the extent to which 
they consisted of one or several stocks, and their relations to the 
population of Noricum, are difficult and complicated questions. 
Neither are they true portions of German ethnology. 

Hence the present note will contain little beyond the notice of 
the country and its occupants in their present state. 

Politically speaking, Rhsetia with Vindelicia, comprises the fol- 
lowing countries and districts. — 1. The Vorarlberg. 2. The Gri- 
sons, or Graubrundten. 3. The Valteline. 4. The Tessino. 5. The 
Tyrol. 6. Part of Lombardy. These form Rhaetia proper. The 
southern part of Bavaria, the south-eastern part of Wurtemburg, 
and a small portion of Baden constitute Vindelicia. 

Geographically viewed, this area embraces a portion of two water- 
systems, and a water-shed, viz., the southern feeders of the Upper 
Danube, and the northern feeders of the Po ; the water-shed between 
them being formed by the Alps. Besides these the head-waters of 
the Rhine belong to Rhaetia. 

* Or the Phceti and Pannonitz. 



NOTES ON SECTION I. 11 

The Bavarian side of the great Alpine chain consists of an 
elevated table-land, the Italian of a series of mountain-valleys, 
which change in character as we approach the alluvial plain of 
Lombardy ; and as these change, we pass from Rhsetia to Italy, 
from the Tyrol and Switzerland to Lombardy. 

At the present moment the population of this area is referable to 
two divisions. A German dialect of the Alemannic type is spoken 
in Bavaria, Wurtemburg, Baden, the Vorarlberg, and greater part 
of the Tyrol. The remaining dialects are derivatives from the Latin. 
It is necessary to know that these last fall into two divisions ; the 
Italian of Lombardy, the Valteline, and Tessino, and the Romance 
of the Grisons or Graubriindten. It is the Grison or Graubriindten 
country which is pre-eminently and typically Rheetian ; the Grison 
mountains are the Rlicvtian Alps, and the Grison form of speech 
is often called the Rheetian language. 

If, from the Lake of - Constance, we follow up the Rhine towards 
its source, we find that river and the Inn rise on different sides of 
the same range of mountains. Now the valleys of the Upper Rhine 
and the Upper Inn constitute the Grison country, where the Ro- 
mance language is spoken, and where it falls into two chief dialects, 
coinciding with the two river-systems. The proper Romance is the 
language of the hills and valleys on the Upper Rhine ; the Ladino, 
or Latin, that of those on the Upper Inn. Then sub-dialects occur ; 
the Ladino falling into the Upper Engadino, and the Lower Enga- 
dino ; the Romance into several similar ones. 

Such is the present philological ethnography of the Rhsetias. 
But as both classes of languages have been introduced into the 
country within the historical period— the German in the fifth and 
sixth centuries, and the Roman in the time of Augustus — neither 
throws much light upon the character of the original population. 

Were there any Germans in Rhaetia ? Germans might have been 
found in the northern point of Vindelician Rhsetia, just as there 
were Germans in Gaul ; i.e., as intrusive emigrants, but not as inte- 
gral portions of the original Rhseto- Vindelician population. 

5 Pannoniis.] — Laying aside the question. as to the distribution 
of the populations of Noricum, the portion of the Danube which 
separated Pannonia Proper from the Germany of Tacitus, was that 
part which lies between the northern extremity of the Kahlenberg 
(lions Cetins), and the continuation of the Bakonyer Wald (Pan- 



12 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

nonius Mons) into the Medves Range (Sarmatici, Montes) ; from the 
west to Vienna, to the east of the Gran. A little heyond this the 
Danube takes its great bend southwards, and separates the eastern 
Pannonians from the Jazyges. The parts of the Germania of Tacitus 
which reach the Pannonian part of the Danube, coincide with the 
present country of Upper Hungary, or the valleys of the Gran and 
Waag. 

The languages here spoken are, at the present moment referable 
to three families, — 1. German in Lower Austria, and on the side 
of Lower Austria. 2. Slavonic on the side of Styria, Croatia, and 
Slavonia. 3. Majiar, or Proper Hungarian in the central parts. 

The present population of Pannonia cannot but be extremely 
mixed, since, over and above the present occupants, there have been 
successive invasions of Romans, Goths,- Huns, Avars, Cumaniars, and 
Gepidse. All this complicates the inquiry as to the ethnological 
position of the original ante- Roman Pannonians. 

At the same time, by eliminating those elements, which we know 
to have been of recent introduction, we approach the cpiestion. 

Of these two have occurred within the historical period. 

The Germans of Lower Austria are the Germans of Upper Austria 
advanced eastwards, and the Germans of Upper Austria are the 
Germans of Bavaria similarly protruded. Their language is refer- 
able to the Alemannic type ; their original ancestors were probably 
Alemanni, and the date of their occupancy is not earlier than the 
fourth century. 

The Majiars are even of later introduction, and their advent even 
more within the range of history. It took place in the tenth century. 

The Goths, Huns, Avars, Cumanians, have all occupied parts of 
Pannonia — but all within the historical period, or nearly so. ' The 
aborigines preceded all these. 

The original population of Pannonia must be arrived at by the ex- 
clusive method, i.e., the elimination of all known recent populations. 

Now the population that remains after this is that of the Slovaks 
of Upper Hungary, who are Slavonians. 

The ethnology of those parts of Pannonia which was not German 
is no part of the present work. Many reasons, however, beyond 
the existence of the Slovaks could be given for making it Sla- 
vonian. 

At the same time, there is but little doubt that the banks of the 
Danube were occupied by intrusive Germans at an early period. 



NOTES ON SECTION I. 13 

6 Rheno.] — The Rhine, is a name by which the same river is 
known to both the French of its western, and the Germans of its 
eastern bank. This is not always the case in the frontier rivers ; 
since they may bear one name in one language, and another in another. 
It is far from certain that this was not the case with the Rhine 
originally. 

The French and Germans know it by the same name, not because 
their ancestors did, but because each has taken their appellation 
from the Romans ; the word Rhenus is in the same category with 
Germania. 

From whom did the Romans take it 1 To what ancient language 
is it referable 1 Almost certainly to the Keltic of Gaul ; in which 
the Gauls originated, but the Romans diffused the name. It might 
of course have been German as well ; though I think it unlikely, the 
original German name being probably lost. 

Neither is it certain that the name Rhine was persistent through- 
out the whole course of the river. The Lower Rhine might have had 
one name, the Upper Rhine another, just as the Lower Danube was 
called Ister, and the Upper, Danubius. It is not likely that the 
Batavians of Holland, and the Helvetians of Switzerland gave the 
same name to the very different parts of their common river. Names 
of rivers only become general where there is one homogeneous popu- 
lation along their whole course ; or, what is the same thing, when a 
second party perceives the unity of the whole water-system. This 
was what was done by the Romans, and that is the reason for believ- 
ing that, originally, the name Rhine was a partial one. 

Is this term, or one like it, applied to any other Keltic rivers., so 
that there may be several Rhines in France, just as there are several 
Ouses and Avons in England 1 The bearing of this question is of 
importance. As the question stands at present, the word is a Keltic 
gloss of no great value, though of some. It is only a proper name. 
If, however, it reappears as the designation of other rivers, the chances 
are that it is no proper name, but a common term ; no word, like 
John or Thomas, but a word like water, river, stream. Glosses of 
this kind are more valuable than the others. 

Rhen is probably the same root as Rhodan ; so that Rhine and 
Rhone are the same word in different dialects. The disappearance 
of the d creates no difficulty. The very word Rhone, as compared 
with Rhodanus, illustrates it. 

It is also, probably, the same word with E-ridan-us ; the ejection 



14 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

of the -d, being of the same kind as that of the d in Rho-d-anus as 
opposed to Rhone. The Eridanus of Herodotus (iii. 115) was a river 
in the extreme west of Europe, which fell into the northern sea. 

The form Rhenus was first diffused by Ccesar. 

The fact of rein in German meaning clear, and the possibility of 
the Rhein fiuss = the clear river, is the only reason that has ever 
been given for considering the word of German origin. Even Zeuss 
lays no stress on this. 

The Keltic origin of the name of the great frontier river is gener- 
ally admitted. So is the Keltic origin of the names of most of its 
western tributaries, the Nava and the Mosa. The river Obringa, 
'ASptKKag, 'OgptyyaQ, is probably Keltic. The Mosella seems a 
Roman diminutive of Mosa. 

Of the eastern feeders, the Maenus and Luppia are of uncertain 
origin. So are the Nicer and Logana. The Rura and Sigana are, 
perhaps, German. 

7 Danubio.] — The extent to which the root Danub- approaches that 
of Dnap-, in the undoubtedly Slavonic Dnaparis, or Dnieper, is an 
argument, as far it goes, for the word being of Slavonic origin. 

The extent to which the root D-n, as in Don and Boon occurs in 
the name of Keltic rivers, is an argument, as far as it goes, for the 
word being of Keltic origin. 

The fact of its changing its name to Ister, for the lower portion of 
its course, is an argument, as far as it goes, in favour of the population 
of the banks being other than homogeneous, i.e., of one kind, at the 
head-waters, of another towards the mouth. 

8 Fluminibus.] — Let the direction of river from north to south, 
or vice versa, be called a latitudinal or a vertical direction ; and a 
direction from east to west, or vice versa, a longitudinal or hori- 
zontal one. 

This distinction gives rise to the consideration of some points of 
general ethnology. 

The more vertical the direction of a river — other things being 
equal — the less homogeneous its population. 

The more horizontal the direction of a river — other things being 
equal — the more homogeneous its population. 

A little consideration explains this. Difference of latitude is a 
great ethnological influence ; and as the character of a population 



NOTES ON SECTION I. 15 

changes as we proceed either northwards or southwards more than it 
does in a direction from east to west, or from west to east, the con- 
trast between the population of the head-waters, and the population 
of the embouchures of long rivers is greater where the difference of 
latitude is greatest, and least where it is least — other things, as said 
before, being equal. 

The great vertical rivers of Northern Asia have the conquering 
Mongol and Turks on their sources, the stunted Samoeids on the 
mouths. 

The great vertical rivers of Southern Asia have Tibetan moun- 
tains, between the thirtieth and thirty-fifth degrees of north latitude, 
and Siamese and Cambojians in latitude ten. 

The Nile has Negroes in its extreme valleys, Abyssinians on its 
table-land, and ^Egyptians on its great valley and Delta. 

The northernmost Mississippi Indians approach the type of the 
Eskimo, the southernmost that of the Mexicans. 

Most of the great rivers of the world are vertical ; the chief hori- 
zontal directions being those of the Amazon in America, the Sene- 
gal in Africa, the Hoang-ho and Kiang-ku in Asia, and the Danube 
in Europe, 

The horizontal direction of the two great Chinese rivers undoubt- 
edly does much towards determining the homogeneous character of 
the Chinese civilization. At the same time they help to account 
for its isolation. 

The direction then is one of difference between the Danube as 
boundary to Germania and the Rhine. 

The course of the Danube determined the migration eastward, 
those of the Rhine (and still more of the Weser and Elbe) north- 
ward. 

Another difference between the two rivers is the character of their 
water-system. Contrasted with the Danube the Rhine has but few 
feeders ; indeed it has but few feeders compared with any river of 
equal magnitude, unless it be the Rio Grande of Texas. The Rhine 
is supported as the reservoir of the Lake of Constance rather than 
supplied by its tributaries. From this it follows that the basin or 
valley-system of the Rhine is preeminently small ; so that its allu- 
vial plains sink into insignificance when compared with those of the 
Danube, or even the Elbe, Oder, and Vistula. Whatever we subtract 
from the area of the valleys of a river, brings the hill-ranges in 
closer approximation to the stream, in which we have a mountain- 



16 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

barrier, as well as a water-barrier. In the particular instance before 
us, the Rhine is a Gallo-Germanic frontier, but it is a frontier 
strengthened in its upper part, at least, by the ranges of the Black- 
forest, the Odenwald, and the Vosges. In its lower portion, as the 
mountains either recede or diminish, and the alluvial plains extend 
themselves, it ceases to be a frontier. 

Again — the facilities of a migration down the Danube are greater 
than those down the Rhine ; a circumstance to which the directions 
of the two rivers, as well as the difference of their water-system con- 
tributes. 

9 Sarmatis.~\ — It is not necessary to exhibit in full the different 
senses in which this word occurs in the classical writers. It is a term 
less wide in its application than Scythce, but, like Scythce, it is 
applied to the northern moieties of the ancient world ; the most 
southern limit of Sarmatia being the Danube. On the west it 
becomes confounded with Germania, on the east with Asiatic 
Scythia. 

Geographically, it chiefly applies to Eastern Europe; Scythia 
being chiefly referable to Western Asia. 

Ethnologically, it embraces nearly all the Slavonic areas, and few 
or none of the «o?i-Slavonic. 

This justifies its application, by the present writer, to the class 
which contains the Lithuanic as well as the Slavonic tongues. 

The Sarniatse of the present text — the Sarmatse of the Germanic 
frontier — are the original occupants of the country between the 
Upper Thiess (Tibiscus) and the Medves Range (Monies Sarmatici). 
These were the northern Jazyges, or the old Slavonic populations of 
Middle Hungary. 

That either these Jazyges themselves, or else their neighbours to 
the east, west, or south were Slavonians, is a fact which is supported by 
internal evidence of the most conclusive kind ; and as the undoubted 
presence of a Slavonic population in the parts occupied by them, is 
of great importance in the investigation of the ethnology of Pan- 
nonia and Dacia, due prominence is given to it by mentioning it at 
the present time. 

The term gazyk (yazyh) is a Slavonic form. 

It means language or speech, v< X\ • r«^cws\ ^ 

But is it also used, by extension, to mean nation, family, or papula- 
tion ? So truly is this the case, that the Slavonic of the first line of 



NOTES ON SECTION I. 17 

the quotation from Nestor * runs, " Ot sichzke lxx i dwn jazylcu 
byst jazyk Slovenesk,"= From such lxx and two tongues is the 
Slovenian tongue. . &m/,*«.*s££ 

The Bohemians and Moravians call themselves Czechsky Gazyk 
and Moravsky Gazyk respectively. 

As this may -j- safely be considered to be the Jazyg- in Jazyg-es, it 
is a sound inference to presume the existence of a Slavonic popula- 
tion whenever that name occurs. 

10 Dacis.] — Ancient Dacia comprises the modern principalities of 
Wallachia and Moldavia ; and it is these two countries which more 
strongly remind us of the Dacia of Trajan and Decebalus. Here it 
is where the language of the Romans still remains ; so that the pre- 
sent Romany of the Lower Danube belongs to the same philological 
division with the French, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, and Grison ; 
in other words, it is one of the daughters of the great Latin tongue. 

But ancient Dacia comprised something more than Wallachia 
and Moldavia. All Transylvania, at least half the Banat, and at 
least half the rest of Hungary, belonged to it. Half-way between 
the Thiess and the Transylvanian boundary, runs a line of supposed 
Roman remains, and these most probably separated the Roman pro- 
vince of Dacia from the independent Jazyges Metanastse of the Thiess. 

Now this was a political division ; but the political division does 
not reach far enough west. In order to bring Dacia in contact 
with Germania, we must make an ethnological frontier, and seek 
for Dacians beyond the province of Dacia. This is easily done, 
since the name was one of a widely-spread and only partially-con- 
quered population. The Daci of the text — the Daci of the Germanic 
frontier — were what Zeuss calls the independent Dacians (freie 
Dahen), and their locality was the Gallician side of Hungary. They 
are said by Pliny to have originally occupied the valley of the 
Tibiscus, from which they were expelled by the Jazyges. 

11 Montibus.~\ — This means the Medves Range and the northern 
continuation of the Bakohyer Wald, the frontier being that of the Ger- 
mans and Dacians, rather than that of the Germans and Sarmatce. 

12 Alpium.~\ — Varieties of form — "AX€ta, Stephanus Byzantinus ; 
"0\€ta, Phavorinus ; 2,d\iria, Lycophron. 

* Prolegom., p. xxiii. f For a shade of doubt on the point, see Epilegom., § Siculi. 

C 



18 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

Origin of the word, Keltic — the root being the root of the word 
Albainn = Albion = hilly land = Scotland == Great Britain — " Gal- 
lorum lingua Alpes monies alii appellantur." — Isid. Hisp., Or. xiv. 8. 

13 Abnoba.] — This name is 'perhaps Ke\tic,=ben + abh,=head of 
the waters. The etymology, however, is but a guess, and nothing 
depends upon it. 

One of the names of the forest of the Mons Abnoba was Silva 
Marciana, the forest of the March, a name very illustrative of the 
extent to which the agri Decumates was a debatable land. 

14 Plures populos.] — In the eyes of the cotemporaries of Tacitus, 
the groups of population along the line of the Danube were — begin- 
ning at its source — as follows : 

1. The occupants of the Decumates agri, on both sides. 

2. The Vindelicians or Northern Rhceti, on the south. On the 
north, the Southern Germans. 

3. Noricum — Upper and Lower Austria, on the south. On the 
north, certain Marcomanni (?). 

4. Pannonia, on the south ; on the north, the country of the 
Quad!. The direction now changes, as we have reached the great 
bend, so that instead of saying the north and south, it is convenient 
to say the right and left banks. 

5. Pannonia continued, on the right ; the country of the Jazyges 
and western Daci, on the left. 

6. 7. The Massias {Superior and Inferior), on the right ; Bacia, 
on the left. 

These coincide with the present countries of 

1. Baden and Wurtemburg=the Decumates agri. 

2. Bavaria =Vindelicia and South Germania. 

3. Upper and Lower Austria= Noricum. 

4. 5. Upper Hungary=Pannonia and the country of the Quadi 
and Jazyges. 

6, 7. Servia and Bulgaria=the Mcesias; Wallachia, Moldavia, 
and Bessarabia (?)=Dacia. 

Ethnologically, I believe, the whole river to have been unequally 
divided between the three great stocks so often mentioned already — 
the Kelts, the Germans, and the Sarmatians, with a few Turks and 
Ugrians towards its mouth. But the proof of this, as well as the 
details, are to be collected from the Notes in general. 



NOTES ON SECTION II. 19 

II. Ipsos Germanos indigenas crediderim, minime- 
que aliarum gentium adventibus et hospitiis mixtos : 
quia nee terra olim, sed classibus advehebantur, qui 
mutare sedes quserebant ; ' et immensus ultra, utque 
sic dixerim, adversus Oceanus raris ab orbe nostro 
navibus aditur. Quis porro, prseter periculum hor- 
ridi et ignoti maris, Asia aut Africa aut Italia relicta, 
Germaniam peteret ? informem terris, asperam coelo, 
tristem cultu aspectuque, nisi si patria sit. Celebrant 
carminibus 2 antiquis (quod unum apud illos memorise et 
annalium genus est) " Tuistonem 3 deum terra editum, et 
filium Mannum, 4 originemgentis conditoresque. Manno 
tres filios adsignant, e quorum nominibus proximi Oce- 
ano Ingsevones, 5 medii Hermiones, 6 ceteri Istsevones 7 
vocentur." Quidam autem licentia vetustatis, " plures 
deo ortos, pluresque gentis appellationes, Marsos, 8 Gam- 
brivios, 9 Suevos, 10 Vandalios n adfirmant : " eaque vera 
et antiqua nomina. Ceterum Germanise vocabulum 
recens 12 et nuper adclitum : quoniam qui primi Rhenum 
transgress! Gallos expulerint, ac nunc Tungri, tunc 
Germani vocati shit : ita nationis nomen, non gentis 
evaluisse paullatim, ut omnes primiim a victore ob me- 
tum, mox a seipsis invento nomine, Germani voca- 
rentur." " Fuisse apud eos et Herculem" 13 memorant, 
primumque omnium virorum forfcium ituri in proelia 
canunt. 

NOTES ON SECTION II. 

1 Nec terra olim, sed classibus advehebantur, qui mutare sedes quasre- 
bant.~] — This appears at first to be the remark of a Greek rather than 
of a Roman writer ; the induction upon which it rests being sup- 
plied from the maritime enterprises of the Greeks and Carthaginians. 
But, in truth, it is a statement of great import and generality ; of 
an import and generality probably scarcely appreciated by Taci- 
tus himself, and certainly unappreciated by the majority of his 

c2 



20 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

commentators, as well as by writers on history and ethnology in 
general. 

Far too many inquirers either adopt or acquiesce in the current 
notion that migrations are phenomena, which we may assume to any 
extent required, not only on account of the facts demanding explana- 
tion, but in order to sustain the accuracy of even indifferent authors. 
To such, it is as easy to bring a population from the Baltic to the 
Mediterranean, across a whole series of hostile countries, as to move 
a knight across a chess-board. The great name of Niebuhr justifies 
this gratuitous prodigality of locomotion. Nay more, it seems so 
philosophic to trace a so-called national movement to its primary 
cause, that a known invasion in one quarter is often supposed to 
justify the assumption of an unknown one elsewhere — so that 
nations press each other forwards, themselves being pressed upon. 
This doctrine, with metaphors and illustrations to match, is plausible 
enough to be widely recognised. 

It means, in its naked form, that a attacks b, because he cannot 
support himself against c, c being similarly situated in respect to 
d, and so on ; a view which makes the great qualification for the 
attack of another nation's country, the inability to defend one's 
own. 

This doctrine we would gladly believe to be true. It would 
diminish by nine-tenths the crimes of the warlike part of the human 
species. It would reduce all but the first primary movements to a 
matter of necessity, and so justify them. The motives for aggres- 
sion would not be envy, cruelty, and cupidity, but the unpleasant 
necessity of choosing between reparation for what has been lost to 
yourself by the appropriation of what belongs to another, and death 
or bondage. 

A little analysis, and a few distinctions, will show that, instead of 
migrations being thus common, they are eminently rare. 

A migration is different from a mere extension of frontier. No 
one says, that when the whole American population presses west- 
wards, at the rate of (say) twelve miles a year, there is a migration. 
The frontier has been advanced ; the advancing population being 
continuous with the stationary, and no separation of one portion of 
the American population from another having taken place. The 
Russians are gradually encroaching upon the Siberians ; and the 
English on the Welsh ; yet none of these are instances of migration. 

A migration is different from a return, or re-migration. No 



NOTES ON SECTION II. 21 

one would call the retreat of the ten thousand Greeks a migration 
in the usual sense of the term. 

In order to even approach the idea of a true migration, there 
must he a fresh country ; and there must be a discontinuity of area 
as well. In other words, a migration implies the occupation of one 
area by the inhabitants of another, combined with the non-occupation 
of the intervening parts. Without this latter element, it is a mere 
extension of frontier. To apply an illustration already made, a 
migration is like the JcnigMs move at chess. 

If these intervening parts be portions of the ocean, or a river, their 
non-occupation is a matter of course ; and hence, migrations by 
water are common. If, however, they be by land, they are so rare 
that, throughout the whole history of the German stock, I know no 
unexceptionable instance of one. 

Alsatia, Franche-Comte, Burgundy, Switzerland, and France (so 
far as it is German), became Germanized by extension of frontier. 
By extension of frontier the Slavonic tribes were displaced. 
Theodoric's conquest of Rome was as little a migration as the 
seizure of the empire by the hands of any commander in Pan- 
nonia would have been. It was a mere military occupation. 

The Anglo-Saxon migration was by sea ; and that the Gothic 
invasions of Alaric and others were the same, is highly pro- 
bable. The Goths themselves, probably, reached Moesia by navigat- 
ing the Danube. 

For a migration to be unexceptionable, the evidence of its occur- 
rence must be unexceptionable also ; i.e., it must be referable to 
contemporary testimony. This is because migration was as favorite 
a mode of accounting for the more irregular distributions of popula- 
tion with ancient writers as it is with modern. 

The difference between migrations and great military movements 
is difficult to draw. If, however, we choose to distinguish between 
an army with a number of camp-followers, and a migration properly 
so-called, by considering that the presence of females, aged men, 
and children, is necessary to constitute the latter (making it a move- 
ment, TravSr/fxel) the rarity of this presumedly common phenomenon 
is indefinitely enhanced — so much so, that a land migration (as 
distinguished from one by water), a migration with separation from 
the original area (as distinguished from mere advance of frontier), a 
migration to a fresh land (as distinguished from a return), and 
a migration navcrjiuei (as distinguished from a multitudinous army) 



22 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

is an occurrence of which the whole range of history gives us no 
undoubted instance. 

Even the approaches to this are not numerous ; the most remarkable 
of these being the Helvetic, as described by Caesar, and the Majiar, 
of the ninth century, by which Hungary was peopled by Ugrians. 
Nevertheless, the former, as far as we follow it, was a mere advance 
of frontier, and the latter a military conquest. 

2 Carminibus.] — The earliest verses in any Gothic languages are the 
older poems of the Anglo-Saxons ; indeed, with the exception of the 
Gospels of Ulphilas, and a few other fragments of the Moeso-Gothic, 
referable to the fourth and fifth centuries, the oldest specimens of 
any Gothic tongue, in any shape whatever — prose or verse — are to 
be found in that dialect. In the Mcoso-Gothic, nothing is extant 
but prose. 

These poems must be considered in respect to their form and 
their subject. 

a. The form. — Judging from the earliest poems that have come 
down to us, poems which there is no good reason for believing were 
essentially different from those of the time of Tacitus, the metre 
was alliterative. There was accent, and there was the recurrence of 
similar sounds within certain j^riods ; but there was no quantity, as 
in the Latin and Greek, and no rhyme, as in the English, German, 
and French. The rule was that within the space of one long or two 
short lines, two or more accented initial syllables should begin with 
the same letter. 

All the vowels were considered as identical ; so that three words 
beginning with a, e, or u respectively, would all be considered as 
beginning with a, and stand in alliteration to each other. The fol- 
lowing extract is from the beginning of Beowulf, a poem of consi- 
derable antiquity, and known as the longest specimen of the Anglo- 
Saxon heroic narrative. The alliterative syllables are in Italics. 

Hw^t we (?ar-Dena What we of Gar-Danes 

in ^rear-dagum, In yore-days, 

peod-cyninga, Of people-kings 

]>rym ge-frunon — Glory have heard — 

hu $a oepelingas How the iEthelings 

ellen fremedon — Power advanced — 

oft Scyld Reefing, Of Scyld Scefing. 



NOTES ON SECTION II. 23 

sceafen(a) preatum, To the hosts of enemies (scatters). 

monegu maegjmm, To many tribes, 

meodo-setla of-teah — The mead-settle pulled (them) off. 

egsode eorl — The earl terrified, 

sySSan ce'rest wearS Since he first was 

/ea-sceaft /unden ; An outcast found. 

he pees /rofre ge-ba(d), He therefore joyful abided, 

weox under ^0olcnum, Waxed under welkin, 

weorft-myndum f»ah ; With worth-memorials throve. 

o<5 f him «2g-hwlyc Till him each 

para ymb-sittendra, Of them around-sitting 

ofer Aron-r&de, Over the whale-road, 

hyr&n scolde, Hear should, 

#omban ^yldan— Tribute pay. 

b. The subject. — In the early poems alluded to, the subject is what 
the present statement of Tacitus leads us to expect. The deeds of 
great warriors are narrated, and the poems approach the character of 
epics. Beowulf, the poem last quoted, contains upwards of seven 
thousand lines. Its hero is an Angle ; whose exploits are battles 
against both men and monsters, involving no small amount of super- 
natural agency. Hence, it is mythological rather than historical. 
The chief localities are the fen-districts of Hanover and Sleswick- 
Holstein, on the Saxon, Frisian, and Danish frontiers. Of England 
there is no mention. Hence, although the dialect is Anglo-Saxon, 
it must be considered as exhibiting those Hanoverian Saxons who 
took no part in the English migration. Again — although, in the 
form in which it has come down to us, there are several passages 
which prove the latest transcriber to have been a Christian, the 
nucleus of the poem is referable to the times of German paganism. 
Lastly; it contains several so-called episodes. Of course, these may 
be looked upon as integral parts of the original poem — just like the 
episode of Sin and Death in the Paradise Lost. Nevertheless, the 
more probable view is that they are smaller poems, out of which 
the longer epic has been subsequently constructed — rhapsodically. 

The Battle of Finnesburh is a fragment, and has the appear- 
ance of referring to a real historical event more than Beowulf. This 
is also, to all appearances, Hanoverian. 

In the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, the entry under a.d. 937, in- 
stead of being a statement in prose is a poem of considerable length, 



24 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

known under the title of The Battle of Brunanburg. Many other 
such poetical extracts could be added from either the Anglo-Saxon 
Chronicle, or from the Heimskringla of Snorro Sturleson, in Icelandic. 
Sometimes they stand as authorities : sometimes they replace the 
prose narrative. 

Such are some of the poems whose form and contents most help us 
to realize the nature of those older records to which Tacitus alludes. 

But there are other sources besides. After the great and per- 
manent conquests of such sovereigns as Theodoric and Alboin, 
Gothic historians who wrote in Latin, investigated the old poems 
and traditions of their nation ; and, although these poems and tra- 
ditions in their original forms are lost, the matter of them may be 
found in more than one writer of the sixth, seventh, and eighth 
centuries. Of these the most famous are Jornandes and Paulus 
Diaconus, one for the Goths of the East in the sixth, the other for 
the Lombards in the eighth centuries. — See Epilegomena. 

Again — in the old laws traces of metrical expression may be 
found. 

Lastly, the numerous poetical narratives of the twelfth and thir- 
teenth centuries contain, amongst many other heterogeneous ele- 
ments, both in the way of tradition and mythology, much that 
is both indigenous and ancient. 

Nevertheless, the difficulty of reconstructing the traditions of the 
time of Tacitus are great and, perhaps, insuperable. We are fortu- 
nate in approaching a distinct conception of them so nearly as we do. 

3 Tuistonem.] — All the statements that I can make concerning 
the deity are negative. 

He appears in a definite, unequivocal shape nowhere amongst any 
of the Germanic or Saxon forms of heathendom : nor yet in the 
Edda. 

So exclusively does the notice of him begin and end with Tacitus, 
that it looks as if either the German creeds had changed between 
the second and fifth centuries, or as if the Germans of Tacitus were 
not the Germans of subsequent history. I do not say that either of 
these alternatives was the case. I make the remark chiefly for 
the sake of showing the difference between what we learn from 
Tacitus and what we learn elsewhere, in the way of Gothic my- 
thology. 

Another reading is Tuisco. Perhaps it is the best. It certainly 



NOTES ON SECTION II. 25 

gives us a more Germanic form ; since, by supposing the -isk to be 
the adjectival ending preserved down to our own times in words 
like sel£-isk, we have a truly Gothic termination. Yet this is but 
little. Tu-isco, if dealt with as an adjective derived from a simpler 
form Tu-, would still leave a difficulty : since it is not likely that 
the name of a deity would be given in an adjectival form — i.e., as 
an epithet rather than as substantive name. Who ever heard of the 
Greeks worshipping "Apsiog (instead of'Ap^e), or of the Romans 
considering Martialis (rather than Mars) as their founder's father 1 
Precisely the same is the unlikelihood of Tuis-c-o being an ad- 
jective. 

For this reading, however, Zeuss argues strongly ; and I draw 
attention to his reasoning for the sake of objecting to it. It is clear, 
that, when we say that such or such a form is the right reading, 
because it gives us certain results, and then that those results are 
to be admitted because such or such a reading is to be found, we 
argue in a circle. The reading must stand on its own proper 
grounds, i.e., the value and number of the MSS. wherein it occurs. 
To correct it on the strength of anything inferred from the correc- 
tion itself is illegitimate. Yet this is nearly always the case with 
the commentators on the Germania, e.g., in the case of the word 
in question, Zeuss writes thus : " Tuisco (Tuisto is the wrong read- 
ing), which is better with the vowel transposed (Tiusco), is in 
respect to its derivation like Cheru-sci, and is in the same relation 
to Tiu (= deus) as the later form mannisco, mennisco or mensch is 
to the older mann." — P. 72. 

Surely, instead of this bare statement, the collation of the MSS. 
should have been laid before the reader. 

To such high authorities then as Zeuss, the adjectival form of a 
deity's name is no objection. Neither does it seem to be so to 
Grimm, who, consequently, takes Tuisco as the reading, and Ty- as 
the root. This latter is thus declined in the Norse of the Edda. 

Nom. Ty-r. Gen. Ty-s. Ace. Ty. 

The Old High German form is Ziu, and the Anglo-Saxon Tiw. 
This is the deity that gives its name to Tue-s-day. 

By carrying out this view we make Ziu=Tiu=Tiv=Div, the 
root in div-us; thus connecting the classical and Gothic mythologies. 
— D. M. ad voc. 

4 Mannum.] — All that applies to the word Tuisto (or Tuisco), 



26 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

applies to the root Mann-, also. It belongs to the German mytho- 
logy, as explained to the informants of Tacitus. It is foreign to it 
in all its later and more specific forms. 

At the same time, the criticism which gets over the difficulties pre- 
sented by the one name grapples with those that attend the other. 
Hence, Jfa?inw=man, and denotes humanity ; even as Ty=Tiv= 
Div- denotes div-inity. 

5 Ingaivones.] — In the Anglo-Saxon poem of Beowulf we find these 
lines — 

Ing woes oerest Ing was first (erst) 

Mid East-denum With (the) East-Dene 

Gesewen secgum ; Seen men ; 

06 he siSban east Until he afterwards (since) eastward 

Ofer va?g gevat. Over (the) wave went. 

Dus Heardingas Thus (the) Heardings 

Done hade nemdon. The man named. 

II. 779—787. 
Again — Freyr, one of the Eddaic deities, is called Ingvi-J?rejr. 
Thirdly — the root re-appears in several proper names ; e.g. in 
Tng-uiomerus, — the older form of Hincmar. 

Lastly — one of the heroic royal families of Sweden is Yng-ling-ar, 
or descendants of Ingvi ; ar being the sign of the plural number, 
and ing, like •tcrjg in Greek, a patronymic form. 

Beyond this, nothing in any later writer or record illustrates the 
term Ing-cevones. 

6 Hermiones.~\ — In numerous Old German and Norse compounds 
the element -rni-n is found as a prefix ; its power being to convey the 
notion of vastness, antiquity, or some similar reverential idea. Thus 
Irmin-diot=tke human kind; Iormund-adr=the great serpent. 

More famous still was the Irmin-sul of the Old Saxons of West- 
phalia 3 a pillar or column embodying to the last the superstitions 
of the nation, and, finally, destroyed by Charlemagne. 

Again — the word Hermunduri, as applied to certain Germans of 
the south-east, is a similar compound. 

Lastly — the names Arminius= Herman contain the same funda- 
mental sounds. 

Beyond this nothing in any later writer illustrates the term 
Hermiones. 



NOTES ON SECTION II. 27 

7 Istcevones.'] — Here the reading is doubtful, Isccevones being 
another form. 

The existence of an heroic (or semi-heroic) family called Astings, 
gives us the nearest approach to the illustration for the former ; the 
root Ask, in Ascipurgium, for the latter. See not. ad v. 

It may safely be said that the carmina antiqua that explain any 
part of the mythology in a satisfactory form, are as thoroughly lost 
as the mythology which suggested the carmina antiqua. 

8 Marsos.] — The locality of the Marsi was the country about Essen, 
in Westphalia. — See Epilegomena, § Chattuarii. 

9 Gambrivios.~\ — What applies to the Marsi applies to the Gambrivii 
also ; to which it may be added, that the Gambr- in this latter word 
is, in the opinion of Zeuss, the -gambr- in Si-cambr-i. 

For further notice, see Epileqomena v. Sicambri. 



10 Suevos.~\ — See Epilegomena in v. 

11 Vandalios.] — See Epilegomena in v. 

12 Germanice vocdbulum recens.] — This and note I. 1. are comple- 
mentary to each other. 

Notwithstanding the words a seipsis invento nomine, I believe that 
the word German was as foreign to the ancient Germans, as the 
word Welsh is to a Cambro-Briton. The natives of the principality 
as is well known, call themselves Cumraig. Welsh, is what they 
are called by their neighbours. 

From Tacitus's own evidence, the name is new. This, which is 
prima, facie evidence of its not being native, is conclusive as to the 
fact of their having originally had no collective designation. 

The particular portion of the Germanic population which crossed 
the Rhine, had two names,— ^m^ri and Germani. Tacitus ex- 
plains this by assuming a difference of time, — one appellation being 
old, the other recent. I know no instance of such a change. The 
real fact seems to have been, that Tungri was the native, Germani 
the Gallic name for one and the same people, — just like Welsh and 
Cumraig, Englishman and Sassenach. 

The extension of the designation of a particular tribe, family, or 
nation, to a whole stock, is well illustrated by the word Grcecia. 



28 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

Small and unimportant, — possibly even non-Hellenic — as the little 
Epirote tribe of the Grceci was, it was they who gave the Roman 
name to Hellas. 

13 Hercidem.]— See Notes, ix. 3. 



III. Sunt illis base quoque carmiua, quorum relatu, 
quern Barditum 1 vocant, accendunt animos, futurt"cque 
pugnae fortunam ipso cantu augurantur ; terrent enim, 
trepidantve, prout sonuit acies. Nee tam voces ilia?, 
quam virtutis concentus videntur : adfectatur praacipue 
asperitas soni, et fractum murmur, objectis ad os scutis, 
quo plenior et gravior vox repercussu intumescat. 
Cetemm et " Ulixem"" quidam opinantur, " longo illo et 
fabuloso errore in hunc Oceanum delatum, adisse Ger- 
manise terras, Asciburgiumque, quod in ripa Rheni 
situm, bodieque incolitur, ab illo constitutum, no- 
minatumque A2KIfITPrOIN. 2 Aram quinetiam 
Ulixi consecratam, adjecto Laertse patris nomine, 
eodem loco, olim repertam : monumentaque, et tu- 
mulos quosdam, Grsecis Uteris inscriptos, in confinio 
Germanise Rbaatiajque adbuc exstare," quae neque 
confirmare argumentis, neque refellere in animo est : 
ex ingenio suo quisque demat vel addat fidem. 



NOTES ON SECTION III. 

1 JBarditum.] — The usual name of the poet in the Germanic tongues 
was scop; in the Scandinavian skald. No such root as bard 
occurs ; and no derivatives of it are known. 

It is to the Keltic languages that it belongs, and is so foreign to all 
the Gothic that, notwithstanding the words barditum vocant, I can- 
not believe that any German ever so designated either his national 
songs, or his national music. That they had much in common with 



NOTES ON SECTION III. 29 

those of the Gauls is credible ; but that the name was the same is 
unlikely. In the present case, then, Tacitus describes a German 
custom by a Gallic name. That his error goes thus far I believe. 
I do not, however, believe that it goes farther ; in other words, I do 
not think that the practice which he describes is so Gallic as not to 
be Germanic also ; or that he has confused the custom as well as 
misapplied the term. 

At the same time there is another view which may be taken. It 
is just possible that Gallic bards might have formed part of the 
retinue of certain German chiefs ; in which case they may have been 
called by their employers by the name they bore at home. However, 
the national character of their functions, consisting as it did of the 
recital of native poems, is against this. 

Lastly — if a reasonable interpretation of the root b-rd-, can be 
obtained from any Gothic tongue, all objections against the present 
statement falls to the ground. 

At present, however, it is best explained by assuming the falli- 
bility of the author in which it occurs. 

Lucan's notice of the bardic poetry and doctrine is as follows : — 

Vos quoque qui fortes animas, belloque peremptas 

Laudibus in longum vates dimittitis sevum, 

Plurima securi fudistis carmina Bardi. 

Et vos barbaricos ritus, moremque sinistrum 

Sacrorum Druidse positis repetistis ab armis. 

Solis nosse deos, et coeli numina vobis, 

Aut solis nescire datum est ; nemora alta remotis 

Incolitis lucis : vobis auctoribus, umbrae 

Non tacitas Erebi sedes, Ditisque profundi 

Pallida regna petunt ; regit idem spiritus artus 

Orbe alio ; longse, canitis si cognita, vitse 

Mors media est. Certe populi quos despicit Arctos, 

Felices errore suo, quos ille timorum 

Maximus, haud urget leti metus ; inde ruendi 

In ferrum mens prona viris, animseque capaces 

Mortis, et ignavum rediturae parcere vitse. 

Pharsal. i. 447—462. 

In Lithuanic the root b-rt appears with the meaning of seer, or 
fortune-teller. 



30 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

2 ASKHIYPriON In German btirg=town, berg=hill, ge-birg-c 

=range of hills. 

As the reading here is IlYPr- (a reading which we must take as 
we find it) the first of these three meanings must be the one admit- 
ted in the first instance. 

Ash, on the other hand, is the English word ash, a prefix which 
applies better to a hill than to a town. This modifies our view, and 
supplies a reason for believing that IlEPr- would have been the 
truer affix. Perhaps the analogy of irvpyoQ misled the classical 
writers. 

That the notion that -purg stands for what would more correctly 
have been -perg, is by no means gratuitous, is shown by the follow- 
ing cases : — 

a. The wooded range of the Westphalian hills is called Saltus 
Tentohwgiensis, not Teutobergiensis. 

b. A similarly wooded range on the east side of Bohemia (the 
Riesegebirge) is called by Ptolemy WoKiGovpyiov opog. 

The use of p for b is a Bavarianism, and suggests the likelihood of 
the form in question being of Alemannic origin. 

Probably the true name was Ask-L-ipirki=Ash4ree Mountains. 

The comparative absence of towns in Germany favours the idea of 
the u being incorrect. 

A long list of words in Zeuss shows the extent to which the ash 
entered into the names of topographical localities — Aslc-i-tuna, Asc- 
a-brunno, Asc-feld, Asch-a-bach, <tc. 

In the Eddaic mythology too it is important. 

a. According to one account Ash and Elm {Ashr and Embla) 
were the first human beings. 

b. The great tree which stood central to the universe was the Ash 
Ygdrasil — the tree of Time, at the root of which gnawed the serpent 
Nidhogg, whilst up and down ran the squirrel Ratatoska. 

Such are the unconnected elements of one interpretation — ele- 
ments to which no one hitherto has given cohesion. 

Another series lies in the word Asgard. 

In the Eddaic mythology the Asas are the dii majores ; whilst 
gard means house =gaard in Danish. Hence As-gard = the habi- 
tation of the Asas ; a Scandinavian Olympus opposed to Middan- 
gard the Middle-gore, or the home of man. 

It has been thought that the As- in Aslcipurgion is the As- in 



NOTE ON SECTION IV. 31 

As-gard ; meaning, consequently, Asas. If so, A^KIIIYPriON is 
the town of the gods. 

The reader will probably prefer the physical to the mythological 
interpretation — even if he be dissatisfied with both. 

Upon the names Ulixes and Laertes, I can throw no light and 
suggest nothing satisfactory. 



IV. Ipse eorum opinionibus accedo, qui " Germanise 
populos nullis aliis aliarum nationum connubiis in- 
fectos, propriam et sinceram et tantiim sui similem 
gentem exstitisse " arbitrantur. Unde habitus quoque 
corporum, 1 quamquara in tanto hominum numero, idem 
omnibus : truces et cseralei oculi, rutilse coma?, magna 
corpora, et tantiim ad impetum valida ; laboris atque 
operum non eadem patientia : minimeque sitim sestum- 
que tolerare, frigora atque inediam ccelo solove adsue- 
verunt. 

NOTE ON SECTION IV. 

1 Habitus — corporum.~\ — This uniformity of physical appearance 
by no means characterizes the present Germans. That the average 
height is greater than that of the Italians, that extremely black 
hair and eyes is rarer than in the south of Europe, and that red 
hair and freckles, and a ruddy complexion with blue or grey eyes, 
and flaxen hair are also commoner, is as much as can safely be said. 

These are in different proportions in different parts of the 
Germanic (or Gothic) area. In Friesland and Sweden they are, 
perhaps, the most common. 

At the same time, the description of Tacitus is no over-statement ; 
since we must not only remember that he wrote as an Italian, 
accustomed to dark skins and black hair, but that, since his time, 
three important influences have been at work upon the Germanic 
constitution. 

a. Increased civilization. 

b. Increased intermixture with foreign nations. 



32 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

c. Extension of area from Germany to Britain, from Britain to 
America : to say nothing of the minor extensions within the limits 
of Europe. 

Lastly, it should be added that the Germans of the Lower Rhine, 
and Westphalia, the Frisians, and Cheruscans, were the sections of 
the population which Tacitus has described most in detail. Now 
these, to judge from the present occupants of the parts in question, 
were amongst the most typical of their stock. 



V. Terra, etsi aliquantd specie differt, in umversum 
tamen aut silvis horrida aut paludibus foeda: 1 humidior 
qua Gallias, ventosior qua Noricum ac Pannoniam 
aspicit : satis ferax, frugiferarum arborum impatiens, 
pecorum fecunda, sed plerumque improcera: ne armen- 
tis quidem suus honor, aut gloria frontis : numero gau- 
dent : casque sola? et gratissimar opes sunt. Argentum 
et aurum propitii an irati dii negaverint, dubito. Nee 
tamen adfirmaverim, nullam Germanise venam argen- 
tum aurum ve gignere: quis enim scrutatus est? posses- 
sione et usu baud perinde adficiuntur. Est videre 
apud illos argentea vasa, legatis et principibus eorum 
muneri data, non in alia vilitate, quam qua? humo fin- 
guntur: quamquam proximi ob usum commerciorum 
aurum et argentum in pretio habent, formasque quas- 
dam nostras pecuniae agnoscunt, atque eligunt : inte- 
riors simplicius et antiquius permutatione mercium 
utuntur. Pecuniam probant veterem et diu notam, 
Serratos, Bigatosque. 3 Argentum quoque magis quam 
aurum sequuntur, nulla affectione animi, sed quia nu- 
merus argenteorum facilior usui est promiscua ac vilia 
mercantibus. 



NOTES ON SECTION V. 33 

1 Silvis horrida aut paludibusfceda.] — The ethnological distribution 
of the Germanic population over these two divisions of country was — 

a. For the forest districts — the ancestors of the Mceso-Goths and 
the High Germans ; their area being Thuringia, Suabia, Franconia, 
Hesse. 

b. For the fen-districts — the Frisians proper and the Chauci. 

c. Divided between the two — the Old Saxons and some of the 
Low Germans ; the Westerwald (saltus Teutoburgiensis) being within 
their limits. 

Of the two representatives of these two physical divisions, the 
extreme types were, perhaps, the Franconians and Frieslanders. 

An important modification of the country, however, is not com- 
prehended within these two denominations, i.e. the sandy heaths and 
barrens of Hanover ; indeed, as they lay beyond the area habitually 
traversed by the Romans, they were, probably, unknown to Tacitus. 
These, when they attain their maximum of elevation and sterility — 
as is the case with the Luneburg Heath — have been allowed to con- 
stitute the nearest approach .to be found in Europe of the Steppe, 
so characteristic of Central and Northern Asia. 

The population that most closely coincided with this division, as 
far as it was German at all (and not Slavonic), was the Anglo-Saxon. 

2 Ece opes sunt.'] — That the German cattle was almost wholly 
kine and oxen (to the comparative exclusion of sheep) is the na- 
tural inference from the absence of the word greges, and the pro- 
minence given to armentis ; an inference strengthened by the notice 
of the German dress, the materials of which were either flaxen or 
leathern ; no mention being made of wool. 

Again, it is a remark of Mr. Garnett's, that, in the present Eng- 
lish, the words connected with the arts of weaving and spinning are 
Keltic rather than Germanic : e.g., 

English. Welsh. 

Clout Clwt. 

Gussett Cwysed. 

Darn Darn. 

Welt Gwald. 

Gown Gwn. 

Mesh Masg. 

Rug Rhuwch. 



34 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

3 Serratos, Bigalosque.~\ — The serrated margin of the ancient 
coins ensured them against being clipped, and showed the extent 
to which they had been worn. 

Any coin might be serratus. On the other hand, those which 
were marked with the biga (or quadriga) were exclusively silver — so 
that serratus applies to the pattern of the coinage, bigatus to the 
material. — See Facciolat. in vv. 



VI. Ne ferrum quidem superest, 1 sicut ex gen ere 
telorum colligitur. Rari gladiis, aut majoribus lanceis 
utuntur: hastas, vel ipsorum vocabuloframeas 2 gerunt, 
angusto et brevi ferro ; set ita acri et ad usum habili, 
ut eodeni telo, prout ratio poscit, vel cominus vel emi- 
mis pugnent : et eques quidem scuto frameaque conten- 
tus est : pedites et missilia spargunt, pluraque singuli, 
atque in immensum vibrant, nudi aut sagulo leves : 
nulla cultus jactatio : scuta tantiim lectissimis colo- 
ribus distinguunt : paucis loricse : vix uni alterive cassis, 
aut galea. Equi non forma, non velocitate conspicui : 
sed nee variare gyros, in morem nostrum, docentur. In 
rectum aut uno flexu dextros agunt, ita conjuncto orbe, 
ut nemo posterior sit. In universum sestimanti, plus 
penes peditem roboris : eoque mixti proeliantur, apta. et 
congruente ad equestrem pugnam velocitate peditum, 
quos ex omni juventute delectos ante aciem locant. 
Definitur et numerus : centeni ex singulis pagis sunt : 
idque ipsum inter suos vocantur : et quod primo nu- 
merus fuit, jam nomen et honor 3 est. Acies per cuneos 
componitur. Cedere loco, dummodo rursus instes, con- 
silii quam formidinis arbitrantur. Corpora suorum 
etiam in dubiis proeliis referunt. Scutum reliquisse 
prsecipuum flagitium : nee aut sacris adesse, aut con- 



NOTES ON SECTION VI. 



35 



cilium mire ignominioso fas : multique superstites bel- 
lorum, infamiam laqueo finierunt. 

NOTES ON SECTION VI. 

1 Neferrvm qitidem superest.] — The statement as to the rarity of 
metal must be limited to being evidence only to the non-existence 
of mining habits and the metallurgic arts,, in ancient Germany. 
Grimm, who has given the following table of the names of the 
metals in different languages, remarks that the names for gold and 
silver agree in the German and Slavonic tongues, but not in the 
Keltic. This latter coinciding with the Latin. 

For brass and iron the German and Latin agree. 

The Ugrian tongues, where they have not borrowed from the 
so-called Indo-European languages, have a wholly different set of 
roots. 



ENGLISH 


BRASS 


GOLD 


SILVER, 


IRON. 


Greek 


^aXzdf 


XQvtrU 


a^yv^oi 


a-l £»£0? . 


Latin 


ses * 


aurum 


argentum 


ferrum. 


Italian 


bronzo 


oro 


argento 


ferro. 


Spanish 


bronze 


oro 


argen 


hierro. 


Romane 


irom 


or 


argent 


fer. 


Walachian 


aram 


— 


ardshint 


fier. 


Albanian 


tfX. 


app 


l^yivr 


yiKov^i. 


Gaelic 


umha 


or 


airgjod 


jaran. 


Welsh 


— 


aur 


arian 


haiam. 


Armorican 


— 


aour 


argan 


houarn. 


Basque 


urraida 


urrea 


cilarra 


burdina. 


Prussian 


— 


ansis 


sirablas 


— 


Lithuania 


waras 


auksas 


sirabias 


gelezis. 


Lettish 


warseh 


selts 


sudrabs 


dselse. 


Slavonic 


bron 


zlato 


srebro 


sbeljezo. 


Russian 


bronza 


zoloto 


serebro 


sheljezo. 


Polish 


broc 


zloto 


srebro 


zelazo. 


Bohemian 


ruda 


zlato 


strjbro 


zelezo. 


Wend 


rada 


zloto 


sljebro 


zelezo. 


Mceso-Gothic 


ais 


gulp 


silubr 


eisarn. 


Old High German 


er 


kold 


silapar 


isarn. 


M. High German 


erz 


gold 


silber 


eisen. 


Anglo-Saxon 


ar 


gold 


seolfor 


tsern. 


English 


ore 


gold 


silver 


iron. 






* Also raudus. 







3(5 



TIE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 



ENGLISH 


BRASS 


GOLD 


SILVER 


IRON. 


Dutch 


koper 


goud 


zilver 


ijzer. 


Icelandic 


eir 


gull 


silfr 


iarn. 


Swedish 


koppar 


puld 


silfver 


jam. 


Danish 


kobber 


guld 


solv 


jern. 


Finn 


kasari * 


kulda 


hopia 


rauta. 


Esthonian 


werren + 


kuld 


hcibbe 


raud. 


Laplandic 


air 


golle 


silb 


roude. 


Majiar 


ertz 


arany 


ezlist 


vas. 



To verify the doctrine that the coincidences in the names of the 
metals are as they are stated to be, a few considerable, but by no 
means unreasonable, letter-changes are assumed. Thus — 

1. JEs, ais, dr, ore and eir are the same words; the change from 
s to r being verified by the oblique cases of the Latin language 
itself — Nom. ces, Gen. cer-is. 

2. The identification of the Slavonic root z-l-t with the Gothic 
g-l-d is also legitimate ; since the change from g or h to a sibilant 
is usual — Kapc-=heart=szird-, in Lithuanic. 

3. The Spanish hierro explains the loss of the/- in ferrum, as 
compared with jern and iron. 

Copper seems to be an exclusively German root ; and copper is 
the metal which, from being earliest worked, is earliest used. 

In Gothic archaeology it is well known that the so-called metallic 
age is separated from the so-called ante-metallic by a broad line of 
demarcation ; the series of facts upon which the distinction rests 
being as follows : — 

a. In certain graves, tumuli or barrows, the implements found 
along with the body, are of bone or stone, wood or leather, to the ex- 
clusion of metal of any kind. 

b. In others, they are of gold or silver, to the exclusion of iron or 
bronze. 

c. In others, of iron or bronze, as well as the more precious metals. 
The general doctrine is, that the third class of graves are the 

newest, the first the oldest ; and, upon this doctrine, a considerable 
number of archaeological and ethnological generalizations have been 
founded ; the civilization (or want of civilization) of the period 
anterior ,to the practice of metallurgy being contrasted with that 
which arose out of the introduction of that art. One of the more 
important hypotheses connected with this distinction has been so 



NOTES ON SECTION VI. 37 

generally adopted, and so elaborately worked out by the geologists, 
naturalists, and philologists of Scandinavia — Escbricbt, Nilson, 
Retzius, Keyser, and others — as to have become almost character- 
istic of their school. It rests upon the belief that the skulls of the 
skeletons of the oldest burial-places, approach in form those of the 
Lapps, Finns, and Ugrians in general : those of the newer ones only 
agreeing with those of the present Germans. Assuming the truth 
of this view (and, without adopting it implicitly, I am not prepared 
to deny it) we have a means of ascertaining the character of the 
earliest populations, not only of Germany and Scandinavia, but of 
many other countries besides — the reasoning running thus — 

1. The antiquity of the grave may be ascertained by the nature of 
the implements and ornaments interred along with the skeleton. 

2. To the antiquity of the grave the skull of the person buried 
has a certain relation. 

3. The osteological differences thus implied are best accounted for 
by the assumption of a change in the stock, family, or race of the 
occupants of the country. 

Of the different elements in the inference drawn from this line of 
criticism, the latter is the most exceptionable. The safe position is 
simply the fact that the oldest skulls are the smallest in capacity. 
Such, at least, is the view from the following Table ; taken from a 
fuller one in Mr. D. Wilson's valuable Archseology and Prehistoric 
Annals of Scotland. It shows the relative proportions of a series of 
skulls of very great, with those of a series of moderate antiquity. 



38 



THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 



Relative 
capacity. 


ft © -IOMO) <-> "*« ft © 

<N p r-H r— p n-H Gs .N©HJpO5rHO0Tf • T 1 "?* • 

d<i r— © oo 05 cb cb :ck^ckcbcbcNCNGq : cb ib : 

n w « (M cw n :: co co co co m co co co co »o 


Horizontal 
periphery. 


-KS -W-.KN O O O HH 


Ditto from occi- 
pital protuber- 
ance to root 
of nose. 


—l ft © -NO 
© r- 'tf CO © CO CO .ffi!Cr-iOiCOrttO<DHNTfC! 
CN — < ^ r^H CN <?} CN I^COCNckcqdltjqCNCKlC^^cb 


Occipito- 
frontal arch. 


O r-l 

ffi o -^ -h i- iCCCCCO0<l»Ci?DC^Ol»O^00 . co •* o 

co ■>* -•* cb n 1 4jt -+ ic -f "b -* •■* tf rr 1 rt* ^ '■ 4t< cb o 


Ditto from 
upper root 
of zygoma- 
tic proi 


-->z --.'0<~- Ma© 

aDHCCHCoorico'fnc! ; co co : : o ** ,-h 

i< ■i' Tf ■* Tf o -ii c o c o ^ • o «b " ' «5 «3 «s 


Intcrmastoid 
lines. 


mKS 

-CI -101 r-l i-H H<S 

© >h : -- 1 : -* t- :xo>-i>-io>-h?o ; ;r^o : 
ra-tf ■ -^ 'Tf« • cb Tt< cb cb •* -* -* • • ^ -^ • 


Intcrmastoid 
arch from 
upper root 
of zygoma- 
tic process. 


-*1 r-i O C "" 

oo9^nffiOMOHn-*«9HTii . co co © 


Intcrmastoid 
arch. 


m c} . gc qq co co .990D1CHC090 . -* C» . 


Vertical dia- 
meter. 


r— co © co cn c^ <*i :90H-f(pooN : ^ *p t 
-t* «b «b 4t* «s <b •■rjiibibibib'bibib ■ ib " 


Frontal dia- 
meter. 


— t ft M|«0 -W m|« 

c-tH-trtCocKHOiooinosxDnno 


Parietal dia- 
meter. 


^ootpHHT(i(?)coo9HM99t-N0 9i>io 
•b^ib^^iboibibibibibibibibibibibibib 


Longitudinal 
diameter. 


oOHOton'ocifJccnion^wS'iaDQH 




h (N n ^ n oi d n 06 a r-i oi «* ^ ib © n 

HHHIMOqWOlOlOKMM 


•ppo £ia\ *p[o Xp}BJappj\[ 



NOTES ON SECTION VI. 39 

2 Frameas.] — This is a true German gloss. It means a stabbing 
rather than a cutting instrument ; its present power being pfriem= 
punch, aid, bodkin. The fitrze is called p/n'emere-kraut ; the broom, 
pfriemen-holtz ; and the Narclus structa, Ffriemen-grsis. 

Isidorus Hispalensis wrongly derives it from ferr amentum ; 
"Framea gladius est ex utraque parte acutus, quam vulgo spatham 
vocant. Framea autem dicta quia ferrea est, nam sicut ferramen- 
tum sic framea dicitur, ac proinde omnis gladius framea^ — Origg. 
xviii. 6, 3. 

It is difficult to imagine any objections to the connexion between 
framea and pfrieme, except such as arise out of the possibility of the 
modern word having been derived from the gloss in Tacitus — a not 
unreasonable doctrine. This, however, is set aside by the extent to 
which the word is shown by its compound, to be truly German. It 
is also set aside by the extent to which it appears throughout the 
Gothic languages — ■ Dutch priem, Anglo-Saxon preon, Icelandic 
prion. 

Objections, however, have been raised. The p is not exactly the 
sound which, in the eyes of the strict believers in the uniformity of 
letter-changes, grows out of/. Neither is the diphthong exactly what 
would be developed out of a. Neither is the sense exactly the same 
— " The diphthong varies, and the sense does so still more — der diph- 
thong aber abweicht, und der begrif noch mehr." — D. S. i. 515. 

There is no objection to this minute criticism ; indeed, in and of 
itself, it is good. The change from fr- to pfr- is not of the most 
usual sort ; perhaps it is unique. 

Again — the a in framea is short, as shown by a line of Juvenal — 

Per Solis radios, Tarpeiaque fulmina jurat, 

Et Martis frdmeam, et Cirrhsei spicula vatis. — Sat. xiii. 78. 

And a short vowel is not the best origin to a long diphthong. 

Then, as a sword cuts, whereas a framea stabs, the " sense is dif- 
ferent." 

All this is good, if taken alone. It is good against an etymologist 
who asserts that the connexion between pfrieme and framea is so 
undoubted and undeniable that no sane philologist can demur to it. 

It is also good against any other etymology equally exceptionable 
or unexceptionable. 

But it is not good against such an etymology as the following, 
followed up by the forthcoming inferences. 



40 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

a. Framea is either a clerical error, or a mistake for franca. 

b. Franca was a weapon used by the Franks, from whom it took 
its name. 

I will lay before the reader all that can be said in favour of this view. 

a. As admitted, the change from fr- to pfr- is not of a common 
kind. 

b. In the old uncial MS. NC and M are often confused. 

c. France in Anglo-Saxon, and frakka in Norse = javelin. 

d. The Spaniards called axes franciscce after the Franks — "secures 
— quas et Hispani ab usu Francorum, per derivationem Franciscas 
vocant." — Isid. Hispal. xviii. G, 3. 

Observe, that in this last case, the writer who finds an awl, bodkin, 
as too unlike a dagger to connect pfrieme with framea, finds no dif- 
ficulty in connecting an axe with a javelin. 

Observe, too, that francisca, as an adjective, can, at best, but 
mean the Frankish weapon. 

Of the Anglo-Saxon and Norse forms, /ranee and frakka, I by no 
means undervalue the importance. 

Now let us look to the assumptions requisite for this view. 

In Juvenal the word occurs, throughout the MSS., us framea. 

In Tacitus it occurs seven times, and, throughout the MSS., as 
framea. 

Surely the likelihood of the M becoming NC, as opposed to this, 
is only a presumption against a fact. 

But the first Roman writer who, by using the word, introduced 
it into Rome, may have written framea for franca, and so the error 
have been propagated. This, I submit, is only valid against some- 
thing else equally hypothetical. It is not enough to say that an 
author may blunder. If it were so, any man might believe or 
disbelieve what he chooses. The particular likelihood of each 
blunder must be shown. 

Still the assumption may possibly be legitimate ; since it is pos- 
sible that the hypothesis, which arises out of them, may clear away 
numerous and considerable difficulties, do away with numerous and 
considerable improbabilities, and so gain credence on the strength of 
the phenomena for which it will account. 

Let us see what is done in this way. 

It does just the contrary to what it ought. 

The Franks, under the name of Frank, appear in history, for 
the first time, in the second century — no earlier. 



NOTES ON SECTION VI. 41 

To have given, however, the name to a weapon, mentioned by- 
Tacitus and Juvenal, they must have existed under that name 
in the first — existed, as it were, in a latent state, and unknown as 
Franks to the legions and commanders who conquered them. I 
scarcely think that this strengthens the case. 

Still the derivation may be both valid and valuable. It may 
teach us to look for the Franks more closely, and, consequently, to 
find them earlier than is supposed. 

It has done this in the case of its chief supporter. Ptolemy 
mentions a people called, ' 'AvapTotypaicroL, in Pannonia — and these 
are considered to be typcucroi, or tepayicoi. 

But Pannonia is a long way from the Frank country. Not 
too far for an etymologist. They came from the East, as, in the 
eyes of the etymologist, all populations do. 

Sigebertus Gemblacensis writes, " Francis post Priamum, Priami 
filius Marcomerus et Sunno filius Antenoris principantur annis 
xxxvi., quorum ducatu Franci Sicambria egressi consedere secus 
Rhenum in oppidis Germanise." 

Here the force of etymology stops, for it has not hitherto gone so 
far as to connect framea with King Priam. 

But, though all this may be wrong, there was really a relationship 
between the Franks and the Pannonians. Yes ; Augustus planted 
a Sicambrian * legion in Hungary. No such Sicambrian colony, 
however, will make 'AvaprocppaKToi Franks, or deduce the subjects 
of Clovis from the Danube, any more than our Indian possessions 
will make London a colony of Calcutta. 

Now the previous doctrine is not the fruit of the old empirical 
etymology, which took no account of consonants, and looked upon 
vowels as nothing, but the result of those so-called iron-bound 
laws of letter-change, which lead their supporters to demur to 
deducing pfrieme from framea. 

There are certain things less legitimately assumed than an un- 
manageable letter-change ; and a migration which connects the 
Franks to ' AvaprotypaKToi is one of them. 

The doctrine exhibited above is James Grimm's. — D. S. i. 512 
—519. 

But the change from fr-, to pfr-, is by no means a serious dif- 
ficulty ; since there is no proof of its ever having taken place. 

* See Epilegomcna, § Sicambri. 



4:2 the Germany of tacitus. 

"W ho shall say that, although Tacitus wrote framed, the sound was 
not that of pfram ? The combination of an aspirate with its own 
lene, although found in the classical writers, where two syllables 
meet, as in TuTdot and SaV^w, is an impossible combination at the 
beginning of a word. Hence, if the combination which they heard 
in speech, were ever so much pfr-, their mode of representing it, 
or spelling, would be either pr- ovfr-, as the case might be. 

; Women et honor.]— Viz. the word hundred.— See Notes, xii. 5. 



VII. Reges exnobilitate; 1 duces ex virtute summit. 
Nee regibus infinita aut libera potestas : et duces 
exemplo potius quam imperio : si prompti, si con- 
spicui, si ante aciem agant, admiratione prsesunt. 

Ceteriim, neque animadvertere, neque vincire, ne 
verberare quidem, nisi sacerdotibus 3 permissum : non 
quasi in poenam, nee ducis jussu, sed velut deo im- 
perante, quern adesse bellantibus credunt : effigiesque, 
et signa qusedam, detracta lucis, in proelium ferunt. 
Quodque pracipuum fortitudinis incitamentum est, 
non casus, nee fortuita conglobatio turmam aut cu- 
neum facit, sed familiar et propinquitates : 4 et in 
proximo pignora: unde feminarum ululatus audiri, 
unde vagit'us infantium : hi cuique sanctissimi testes, 
hi maximi laudatores. Ad matres, ad conjuges vul- 
nera ferunt : nee illse numerare, aut exigere plagas 
pavent. Cibosque et hortamina pugnantibus gestant. 

NOTES ON SECTION VII. 

1 Reges ex nobilitcde^\ — The best measure of the extent to which the 
highest executive power was hereditary, is to be found in the fact of 
the Cherusci, after the extinction of all the royal family within the 
country, sending to Italy for a Romanized Cheruscan — a sort of 
Edgar Atheling, whose descent more than counterbalanced his ex- 



NOTES ON SECTION VII. 43 

patriation. — " Eodem anno Cheruscorum gens regem Roma petivit, 
amissis per interna bella nobilibus, et uno reliquo stirpis regise, qui 
apud Urbem liabebatur, nomine Italicus. Paternum huic genus e 
Flavio, fratre Arminii ; mater ex Oatumero, principe Chattorum 
erat." — Ann. xi. 16. Even if we refer a great part of this to Roman 
intrigue — a probable assumption — the evidence that the recognition 
of the great element of kingly power — descent — was as true a charac- 
teristic of some of the early 'Germans, as the sense of personal liberty, 
is unexceptionable. 

At the same time, it is possible that, in the more fenny and inac- 
cessible parts of Friesland, parts less surrounded by conterminous 
nations, the approach to either a republican or a patriarchal govern- 
ment may have been closer ; the East Frisians, of all the Germans, at 
the beginning of the period of undoubted history, being republican. 

The name Italicus (and, besides this, there are several other in- 
stances of Germans with a Roman name) shows the extent to which 
certain individuals, at least, of the Germanic nation were Romanized. 

The German equivalent of what Tacitus renders rex (or rather the 
German word to which Tacitus uses rex as an equivalent) was pro- 
bably cyrving in Anglo-Saxon, Jcuninc Old High German. How 
far, however, this was a derivative from the word cyne=gen-us (kin) 
is uncertain. The best authorities have connected the two. 

2 Ditces.] — The German word to which dux stands in the same 
relation as rex does to cyning is uncertain. At the beginning of the 
literary period we find Anglo-Saxon heretoga, and Old High German 
herizzoJio the equivalents to dux ; and at the present day her-zog-thum 
in High German, and her-tug-dom in Danish mean duke-dom. 
Whether, however, the combination h-r + t-g was as old as the time 
of Tacitus is uncertain. 

Perhaps the oldest form of our word earl {eorl Anglo-Saxon, jarl 
Norse) has a better claim — at least for the Saxons and Scandinavians. 

The fact that makes the compound h-r + t-g doubtful is the pos- 
sibility of the German word -tog having originated out of the Latin 
dux (duc-s). 

Supposing, however, the two words to have existed, it is probable 
that the heri-toga found his duty on the marches, the eorl in the more 
central parts of the country. 

3 Sacerdotibus.] — The pagan name to what Tacitus considered sacer- 



44 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

dos the equivalent, is difficult to ascertain. The word to which I most 
incline is some composition of the root blot=litare ; perhaps blot- 
man. A Burgundian gloss sinistus=sacerdos has come down to us. 

4 Families et propi?iquitates.~\ — Ctesar's term is cognationes. 

The probable name for this was mceg-sceaft=-mate-ship, or sib- 
sceaft=sib-ship. 

The family itself was mceg^i ; each member a mag a ; plural mceg-as. 
The family-bond was mceg-burh. 

In Beowulf the warriors who desert their chief are told that 
" thenceforth they have forfeited the rights of citizenship, 

Folcrihtes sceal 
Ssere msegburge 
monna igwhile 
idel hweorfan. 

not, each of you individually, but each and every man of your kin, 
cognation, or majgsceaft shall be deprived of his rights of citizen- 
ship ; from which we must infer that the misconduct of one person 
might compromise his relatives, who are held responsible for his 
actions." — Kemble, Saxons in England, i. 235. 



VIII. Memorise proditur, quasdam acies inclinatas 
jam et labantes a feminis restitutas, constantia pre- 
cum, et objectu pectorum, et monstrata cominus capti- 
vitate, quam longe impatientiiis feminarum suarum 
nomine timent : adeo ut efficacius obligentur animi 
civitatum, quibus inter obsides puellae quoque nobiles 
imperantur. Inesse quinetiam sanctum aliquid et 
providum putant : nee aut consilia earum aspernantur, 
aut responsa negligunt. Vidimus, sub divo Vespa- 
siano, Veledam, 1 diu apud plerosque numinis loco 
habitant. Sed et olim Auriniam, et complures alias 
venerati sunt, non adulatione, nee tamquam facerent 
deas. 



NOTES ON SECTIONS VIII. AND IX. 45 

NOTE ON SECTION VIII. 

1 Veledam.]— " Ea virgo nationis Bructerae, late imperitabat, vetere 
apud Germanos more, quo plerasque feminarum fatidicas, et auge- 
scente superstifcione, arbitrantur deas. Tuncque Veledce auctoritas 
adolevit ; nam ' prosperas Gerraanis res, et excidium legionum' prse- 
dixerat." — Tac. Hist. iv. 61. This was during the war against 
Civilis, in whose favour the influence of Veleda was exerted. 

Dio Cassius associates her with a virgin named Ganna, placing 
each in the Keltic country : — Mdavoe 3e, 6 ~2efiv6viov fiaatXevg, Kal 
T*dvva Trdf)0svoQ {i)v Se fiera rrjv BeXjj^av ev KeXtikt] $aid£ov<ra) ifkdov 
irpbe rbv Ao/^trtayoV, Kal Tifjirje 7rap' avroii tv^ovteq, dvzKOfxiadriaav. 
— Lib. lxvi. 5. 

This passage is valuable because it shows the probable authority 
upon which the notice of the customs of the Semnones (see not. 
in v.) is founded, viz : that of Masyus himself. 

Of Aurinia no other mention is made. 



IX. Deorum maxime Mercurium 1 colunt, cui certis 
diebus, humanis quoque hostiis 8 litare fas habent. Her- 
culem 3 ac Martem 4 concessis animalibus placant : pars 
Suevorum et Isidi sacrificat. 5 Unde causa et origo 
peregrino sacro, parum comperi, nisi quod signum 
ipsum in modum liburnae figuratum, docet advectam 
religionem. Ceterum, nee cohibere parietibus deos, 
neque in ullam liumani oris speciem adsimulare, ex 
magnitudine coelestium arbitrantur ; lucos ac nemora 
consecrant, deorumque nominibus appellant secretum 
illud, quod sola reverentia vident. 

NOTES ON SECTION IX. 

1 Mercurium.] — The Latin name for the fourth day in the week is 
dies Mercurii ; the English Wednes-day. 

Wedne8-day=Wodens~day. Of the Anglo-Saxon Woden, Wuotan 
was the High German, Opinn the Norse form. 



46 



THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 



From Ihe great importance of Woden in all the Gothic mythologies 
wherein he appears, and from the extent to which he appears in all 
that are at all known, it is likely that Woden was Tacitus's Mercury, 

With Matthew of Westminster, and Geoffrey of Monmouth this 
was certainly the view — " Colimus maxime Mercurium, quem Woden 
lingua nostra appellamus." This is, probably, from Tacitus. 

As both writers, however, lived subsequently to the name of 
Wednesday being given to the fourth day of the week, they scarcely 
pass for independent evidence. 

•• Who invented letters 1 " is one of the questions in the Anglo- 
Saxon dialogue of Solomon and Saturn : the answer being — " Mer- 
cury the giant ; that is Woden the God." 

A metrical homily (all this is from Mr. Kemble) says : — 



Sum man was gehaten 
Mercurius on life, 
se was swioe iacenful 
and swicol on doedum, 
and lufode eac stala 
and leas brednysse ; 
tione macodon Sa haeftenan 
him to niajran gode, 
and tot wega gelretum 
him lac affrodon, 
and to heaguni beorgum 
him brohton onsteghnysse. 
D^es god waes arwurSa 
betwux eallum harfienum, 
and he is 0)>on gehaten, 
63rum naman on Denisc. 
Done feorSan daeg 
hi sealdon him to frofre 
Sam foressedan Mercurie 
heora in reran gode. 



A man there was, called 

Mercury during life, 

who was very fraudulent 

and deceitful in deeds, 

and eke loved thefts 

and deception : 

him the heathen made 

a powerful god for themselves, 

and by the road-sides 

made him offerings, 

and upon high hills 

brought him sacrifice. 

This god was honourable 

among all the heathen, 

and he is called Odin, 

by another name in Danish. 

The fourth day 

they gave for their advantage 

to the aforesaid Mercury 

their great god. 

-and have been — added between 



Other points of resemblance may- 
Woden and Mercury. Were these in existence when Tacitus wrote 1 
If in existence, did they determine his identification 1 This is dif- 
ficult to say. All that can safely be stated is, that, if Woden were 
not his analogue of Mercury, no known deity was. That this is not 
absolutely conclusive is admitted by Mr. Kemble, who writes : " Why 



NOTES ON SECTION IX. 47 

the interpretatio Roinana fixed upon Woden as the corresponding 
god to Mercury, we do not clearly see ; but we are not acquainted 
with the rites and legends which may have made this perfectly clear 
to the Romans." — Saxons in England, vol. i. 338. Other facts 
deepen the shade of this difficulty. Adam of Bremen, in his de- 
scription of the temple at Upsala, writes : " Wodanem vero sculpunt 
armatum, sicuti nostri Martem sculpere solent." 

Nevertheless, if some known god must be the analogue of Tacitus's 
Mercury, and if — besides this — it must be his attributes that deter- 
mine the correspondence, Woden's claim — as aforesaid — is the best. 

But another series of facts make it possible that the correspond- 
ence was determined less by the attributes than the name. 

In more than one of the Gothic languages we have a dialogue in 
which one of the interlocutors is Solomon. Solomon exhibits his 
wisdom in a series of answers put to him by a gibing ironist — who, in 
the Anglo-Saxon dialogue, is called Saturnus, but in several of the 
French ones Marcou, the fuller and older form of which is Marcolf. 
Mr. Kemble, in his edition of the Anglo-Saxon work for the iElfric 
Society, has given elaborate reasons for believing that the Marcolf is 
Saturnus, and vice versa. The sort of fiction is a common one. 
Shrewd common-sense on one side, viewing all things in a practical 
light, and tincturing all things with a caustic irony, is brought into 
collision with the higher wisdom of a true sage ; and, upon the 
ground of a fool being able to ask more questions in an hour than a 
wise man can answer in a day, succeeds in puzzling the higher wis- 
dom of his opponent. 

Now Marcolf is a German name ; and although the Marcolf of 
the dialogue may have grown out of the Mercurius of the Classics, 
after being introduced on German ground, he may also have had an 
independent origin, and have been German from the beginning. 

If so, this origin may have been as old as the time of Tacitus, so 
that that writer's analogue of his own Mercury may have been what, 
subsequently, became Marcolf or Marcou— the name being like, and 
the attributes not unlike. 

Again — there is another view which may be taken. 

The reasoning which has applied to the German analogue of Mars 
may, possibly, apply here also. There may have been a name similar 
to the Greek Ernies ; in which case the process of a Classical writer 
would be, first to identify the deity with a Greek god, and then to 
give the result in a Latin denomination. 



48 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

At any rate, the root -rm— (similar to that of the Greek 'Ep/xj/r) 
occurs in the following notices — " Usee eadera Eres-burg est corrupto 
vocabulo dicta, quam et Julius Coesar Romano Imperio suhegit, 
quando et Arispolis nouien habet ab eo qui Arts Groeca designatione 
et Mars ipse dictus est Latino sermone. Duobus quidem idolis ha)c 
dedita fuit, id est Aris, qui urbis mcenibus insertus, quasi dominator 
dominantium, et Ermis qui et Mercurius mercimoniis insistentibus 
colebatur in forensibus." — Annales Corvienses, ad ann. 1145. 

But it is in the famous word Irmin-sul that this root appears with 
the greatest prominence. Sul=columna ; so that Irmin-sul is a com- 
pound word ; just like Roland-seul, Thors-seid, and JEthelstan-sul. 

The Old High-German glosses explain it by pi/ramis, or similar 
words; e.g., irmin-sffli—pyramides; irman-sul— colossus, altissima 
columna. 

Uf einir yrnn mule 

Stuont ein Abgott ungeheure 

Den hiezen sie ir Koufman. 
or, 

On an Irminsul 

Stood a monstrous idol 

"Which they call (Jiight) merchant [chapman). 

When Charlemagne conquered the Old (Cheruscan) Saxons of 
Westphalia, the demolition of these heathen Irminsuls was one of his 
chief objects. His operations are thus described by the contemporary 
historians — " Domnus rex Karolus perrexit in Saxoniam et conqui- 
sivit Erisburgo et pervenit ad locum qui dicitur Erminsid et succen- 
dit ea loca." — Annal. Petavienses. — " Fuit rex Carlus hostiliter in 
Saxonia et destruxit fanum eorum quod vocatur Irminsuir — 
Annales Laurisham. 

Quotations of this kind can be multiplied. They may all be 
found in the D. M., pp. 105, 106. 

A measure of the vitality of the remnants of the Irmin-cult we 
find in the following verses still current amongst the common people 
of Westphalia : — 

" Hermen, sla dermen 
Sla pipen, sla trummen, 
De Kaiser wil kummen 
Met hamer und stangen 
Wil Hermin uphangen." 



NOTES ON SECTION IX. 49 

or, 

" Hermen, strike 

Strike pipes, strike drums. 
The Kaiser will come 
With hammer and tongs 
Will Hermin up-hang," 

referring to the demolition of the Irminsul by Charlemagne {Kaiser). 

The Irmin here meant may be the hero Arminius deified. His 
attributes, however (truly Mercurial), complicate this view : and the 
fact of an Irmin-cultus in Westphalia is, to a certain extent (I do not 
say how far), a ground for believing that the name Irm- may have 
suggested to Tacitus (or rather to Cassar, who first mentions the 
German Mercury) the parallel of the text. 

Of the previous views I cannot definitely say which is the least 
unsatisfactory. 

2 Humanis — hostiis.~\ — The extent to which this was the custom 
may be measured by the following extracts, chiefly taken from the 
D. M. — " Lucis propinquis barbaraa arae, apud quas tribunos et pri- 
morum ordinum centuriones mactaverunt." — Tac. Ann. i. 61. " Sed 
bellum Hermunduris prosperum, Chattis exitiosius fuit, quia victores 
diversam aciem Marti ac Mercurio sacravere, quo voto, equi, viri, 
cuncta victa occidioni dantur." — Ann. xiii. 57. "Quorum unus 
Radagaisus. . . . Italiam belli feritate aggreditur, promittens san- 
guinem Christianorum deis suis litare, si vinceret." — Isidor. Chron. 
Goth. a.d. 446. " Quern Martem Gothi semper asperrima placavere 
cultura ; nam victims ejus mortes fuere capitorum, opinantes bel- 
lorum prsesuleni aptius humani sanguinis effusione placandum." — 
Jornandes, c. 5. " Mos est remeaturis decimum quemque captorum 
per sequales et cruciarias pcenas, plus ob hoc tristi quod superstitioso 
ritu necare." — Sidon. Apollin. viii. 6. " Si quis hominem diabolo sacri- 
ficaverit, et in hostiam, more paganorum, deemonibus obtulerit, &c." 
— Capitul. de pag. Saxon. 9. " Hoc quoque inter alia crimina agi 
in partibus illis dixisti, quod quidam ex fidelibus ad immolandum 
paganis suis venundent mancipia." — Epistolae Bonifacii, 25. 

That the Kelts did the same is well known. 

So did the Lithuanians. — " Dracones adorant cum volucribus, 
quibus etiam vivos litant homines, quos a mercatoribus emunt, 
diligenter omnino probatos, ne maculam in corpore habeant." — 
Adam of Bremen, De Situ Daniae, c. 24. Here we find the import- 

E 



50 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

ance of the offering being without blemish as definitely recognized 
as in the Levitical Law. 

So did the Huns and others. — "At Scythiani properant et quan- 
toscunque prius in ingressu Scytharum habuere litavere victoria?." — 
Jorn. 25. " Apud Cypri Salaminem humanam hostiam Jovi Teucrus 
immolavit ; idque sacrificium posteris tradidit, quod est nuper, 
Hadriano imperante, sublatum. Erat apud Tauros, inhumanam ac 
feram gentem, ut Diana? hospites imniolarent, et id sacrificium 
multis temporibus celebratum est. Galli Esum et Teutatem humano 
cruore litabant. Ne Latini quidem hujus immanitatis expertes 
fuerunt. Siquidem Latialis Jupiter etiam nunc sanguine colitur 
humano." — Lactant. De Fals. Relig. lib. i. c. 21. 

3 Herculem.~\ — No known German deity has a name sufficiently 
like Hercules to suggest the reasoning that was suggested by the 
name Marcolf in a preceding note, reasoning which will reappear 
in the note that comes next. Hence, it must have been the attributes 
only which determined the identification. 

Continuing the assumption that the analogue of Tacitus's Hercules 
is to be found in the later mythology, it may safely be said that — 
attribute for attribute — Thor is, at least, as like the son of Alcmena 
as Woden was to Mercury. The hammer of Thor might well have 
suggested the club of Hercules. 

Add to this the extent and universality of the belief in Thor : 
both of which imply antiquity. 

4 Martem.] — In a well-known Anglo-Saxon poem in the Runic 
characters we find the following lines : — 

Ear biS egle 
Eorla gehwylcum, 
Sonne fsestlice 
Flaesc onginneS 
Hra colian, 
Hrusan ceosan 
Blac to 



"Wynna gewitaS, 
Wera geswica'5. 
" Ear is a terror to every man, when fast the flesh, the corpse 
beginneth to become cold and pale, to seek the earth for a consort. 
Joy faileth, pleasure departeth, engagements cease." 



NOTES ON SECTION IX. 51 

Mr. Kemble, to whom I owe the whole of the contents of this 
note, truly remarks that if ear=spica, arista, an ear of com, we get 
but an indifferent sense. On the contrary, if ear mean the God of 
War, the force of the passage is manifest. But can ear mean this 1 
The following facts speak in the affirmative. 

Tue-s-day=dies Martis ; a fact which, as far as it goes, makes 
Tiw the analogue of the Roman liars. 

In some parts of South Germany, however, the third day of the 
week is not called Zistag (Tuesday) but Er-tag, Eri-tag, Erich-tag 
instead. Whence Er=Tiw=Mars. 

In Saxon Westphalia, an undeniably heathen spot, now called 
Mersberg, Mons Martis, was originally called Eres-burg. — Saxons in 
England, vol. i. 253. 

Such is the light thrown upon the text of Tacitus by subsequent 
records ; faint but cheering ; cheering but not satisfactory. 

Ear is so like the Greek "Aprjg, that when Tacitus tells us that 
the Germans worshipped Mars, we may reasonably suppose that the 
name rather than the attributes led him to the identification. But 
then, why write Mars instead of Ares ? 

On the other hand, if he looked to the attributes rather than the 
name, Tiw, the undoubted analogue of Mars, in the word Tue-s-day 
(=dies Martis), would be his divinity. 

The exact truth is beyond our reach : indeed, it is very likely 
that his Mars was neither one nor the other. Nevertheless, if the 
choice has to be made between Tiw and Er, it is the latter which 
commands the preference. Tiw has the attributes of Mars only : Er 
has both the attributes and an approach to his (Greek) name as well. 

5 Pars Suevorum — Isidi sacrificat] — I believe that the goddess 
here noticed was identified with the iEgyptian on the strength of 
her name only. 

A goddess named Ziza, was worshipped by the inhabitants of the 
parts about Augsburg ; and either by means of tradition, history, or 
fragments of her cultus, her name was known to Kiichlin, an Augs- 
burg poet of the fourteenth century, a.d. 1373 — 1391. 

" Sie bawten einen tempel gross darein 
Zu eren Zise der abgbttin, 
Die sie nach haidnischer sitten 
Anbetten zu denselben zeiten. 



52 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

Die stat ward genennt auch Zisaris* 
Nach der abgottin, das was der pris. 
Der teinpel als lang stuond unversert 
Bis im von alter was der val beschert. 
Und da er von alter abgieng 
Der berg namen von im empfieng ; 
Daruf gestanden was das werck, 
Und haist noch hiit der Zisenberck" 

" They built a great temple therein, 
To the honour of Zise the heathen goddess 
Whom they after heathen customs 
Worshipped at that time ; 
The city was named eke Zisaris 
After the heathen goddess, that was its glory. 
The temple long stood entire 
Until its fall was caused by age. 
And when it from age went-off 
The hill took the name from it ; 
Whereon the work stood, 
And still hight Zisenberg." 

Confirmatory of this is an extract from the Augsburg Chronicle, 
and, of equal value, is a fragment preserved in two MSS., one from 
Munich, and one from the monastery of St. Emmeram, wherein we 
find a passage, accompanied by marginal notes, headed " Excerpta 
ex Gallica Historia." 

These are too lengthy for quotation ; besides which, they are to 
be found in full in the D. M. pp. 260—272. 

They agree, however, in containing, amongst much inaccurate 
and distorted history, the special statement that the parts in 
question were the head-quarters of the cultus of the Dea Cisa, 
" Quam religiosissime colebant, cujus templum quoque ex lignis 
barbarico ritu constructum, postquam eo colonia Romana deducta 
est, inviolatum permansit, ac vetustate collapsum nomen colli ser- 
vavit. Quinquagesimo nono die, qua eo ventum est, cum is dies 
DecB CizcB, apud barbaros celeberrimus, ludum ac lasciviam magis 
quam formidinem ostentaret," &c. 

* Qu. Ziza arcs — Grimm. 



NOTES ON SECTION IX. 53 

One of the marginal notes is the following couplet. — 

" Quern modo polluerat cultura nefaria duduni 
Gallus monticulum hunc tibi Ciza tulit," 

which, in the Augsburg Chronicle, appears in the body of the 
extract. 

It may, then, be safely said that, in the thirteenth century, the 
memory of a local goddess, named Zisa, was preserved in the neigh- 
bourhood of Augsburg ; and, although the parts about that city 
were, strictly speaking, Vindelician rather than Suevic, it may fairly 
be supposed that the cultus extended into the true Suevic area. 

The following fact diminishes the difficulties involved in the 
difference of form between Isis and Ziza. 

a. Meisterlin, who wrote about a.d. 1456, has the form with 
the final -s, " Cizais — der gottinn Cisa, die auch genent wird Cizais." 
This accounts for the final -s. 

b. The form Eysen occurs. Grimm quotes the expression, " der 
amazonischen Augspurger japetisch fraw Eysen" 

At the same time, it should be remembered that the writers who 
speak of Erau Eysen, may have been disposed to the adoption 
of that form from the name Isis in Tacitus. Hence the evidence 
in favour of the omission of the initial C or Z, is not unexcep- 
tionable. 

That the present text influenced the views of the later writers 
concerning the Augsburg goddess, is certain ; such a phenomenon 
being by no means unusual ; since numerous instances could be 
adduced to show that an inaccurate account of a superstition in an 
influential writer, has acted upon the superstition itself — just as 
certain prophecies fulfil their own accomplishment. 

At any rate, in the sixteenth century, we find Erau Isis with 
certain attributes, which may fairly be considered as foreign, and 
superadded to those of Ciza. Some of these are deducible from the 
notice of Tacitus ; others referable to other sources of confusion. 
Thus, Jean le Maire, writing a.d. 1512, says, " Au temps duquel 
la deesse Isis, royne d'iEgypte, vient en Allemaigne et montra au 
rude peuple l'usaige de mouldre la farine et faire du pain." 

Aventin (about a.d. 1522) says that it was from Fraw Eysen, that 
iron (German eisen) took its name, adding an account of her cultus^ 
wherein mention is made of the ship, and Hercules is said to have 
been her father.— See D. M. i. 244. 



54 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

[nstead, then, of doubtfully suggesting the identity of Ciza and 
Tsis, name for name, as is done by Grimm, I have no hesitation in 
assenting to it. 

"Whether traces of the characteristic navigium can be found 
in an equally satisfactory form, is another question. A long 
quotation from Rodolf's Chronicle of the Abbey of St. Trudo, 
is to be found in D. M. i. pp. 237 — 241. It tells us that, a.d. 
1133, the country-people of the neighbourhood made a ship, put it 
on wheels, rolled it about from town to town, and attended it with 
song and dance from Tongres to Louvain. 

This was done to annoy the weavers. It also annoyed the 
clergy. So much so, that such expressions as navim infausto omine 
compactam — gentilitatis studium — pro/anas simulacri excubias — hor- 
tabantur ut comburatur — maligni spiritus qui in ilia ferebantur — 
in/ mdi ominis monstrum, &c, occur in the account. 

I agree with Grimm in thinking this particular procession, 
although mentioned as a single instance, to have been but the last 
of many previous ones — in other words, a revival of an old custom. 

I also believe its origin to have been pagan. 
But I am not satisfied that it has anything to do with either 
Isis or Ziza. 

a. The locality of the procession was the parts about the Lower 
Rhine and Moselle, that of Ziza, Bavaria, and that of even the Isis 
of Tacitus the country of only pars Suevorum ; so that whilst the 
deity is pre-eminently local, the custom is spread over a vast 
area. 

b. Processions of the kind in question are common, without being 
connected with one another. The celebration of the breaking-up of 
the ice, and the beginning of the season for navigation might easily 
be celebrated on the Danube and on the Rhine with a similar cere- 
monial, without the necessity of supposing the one to have borrowed 
the custom from the other. 

Something of this kind I imagine to have been the case with the 
supposed analogue of the navigium Isidis in Germany, boats being 
wheeled about at the beginning of the sailing season, just as on the 
9 th of January, or Ploicgh-Monday, the labouring men of some parts 
of England go about as Plough-hoys, or Plough-bullocks. 

That either the Isis of Tacitus, or the Ziza * of the Augsburgers 

* Supposing them (as I do not) to be different deities. 



NOTES ON SECTION IX. 55 

should be other than German, is considered utterly improbable by 
the great writer from whom I have taken all the quotations and 
references of the present note. 

That she was Slavonic is the opinion of the present inquirer. 
But the most important fact connected with her cultus, is that of its 
being, at one and the same time — 

a. Suevic, as we learn from the text of Tacitus ; and — 

b. Vindilician, as we infer from her temple at Augsburg. 

6 Cohibere parietibus deos.~\ — This absence of temples is partly 
borne out by what we find in later writers, partly subjected to modi- 
fication. 

A. It is partly borne out by the fact of no German tongue contain- 
ing a simple term equivalent to the Latin templum (delubrum, cedes), 
of which both the signification and the native origin are beyond 
doubt. 

1. In Ulfilas, lepov (Joh. xviii. 20) is translated by Gud-hus= 
God's house. This word, however, occurs but once, and is a com- 
pound. 

2. The usual word =va6g is alhs. 

The reasons for believing this word to be native (the view sup- 
ported by the authority of Grimm) are as follows : — • 

a. The genitive case is alhs, and the dative alh, instead of alhais 
and alhai ; irregularity (so-called) being prima facie evidence of the 
word in which it occurs being native. 

b. In Anglo-Saxon and Old Saxon, the word is of the masculine 
gender. 

c. It may be the word Alces of § 43. 

d. It occurs as an element of several compound proper names, 
both of men and places — Ala-hdlf, ^a-dorp, &c. 

Against it lie 

a. Its likeness to the Latin word aula. 

b. Its being, in Mceso-Gothic, of the feminine gender. 

c. Its absence in all the Norse languages. 

d. Its power of palace or royal dwelling, a meaning quite as 
usual as that of holy edifice. 

It is safe then to say that the native origin of alh=templum is 
not beyond doubt. 

3. V-g is the third root with a meaning allied to that of i 
enumerated in the chapter of the D. M. referred to. 



56 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

Its chief forms are wih, weoh, wig, and ve. It is truly Gothic in 
origin, but, in meaning, fluctuates between grove, idol, and holy 
building, the latter power being the most uncertain. 

1. II-r-lc is in the same predicament. Its chief forms are haruc, 
hara, hearg, horg, and, although it sometimes =templum, its primary 
meaning is lucus, or rather (perhaps) the Greek te/uevoq. 

B. The chief text which modifies the belief in the utter absence of 
temples amongst the Germans is Adam of Bremen's notice of the 
temple at Sigtuna — " Nobilissimum ilia gens templum habet, quod 
Upsula vocatur, non longe positum a Sigtuna civitate vel Birka. In 
hoc templo, quod totum ex auro paratum est, statuas trium deorum 
veneratur populus, ita ut potentissimus eorum Thor in medio solium 
habeat triclinio. Hinc et inde locum possident Wodan et Fricco." 
-De Sit. Dan. c. 233. 

On the other hand, the sacro-sanctitude of trees and groves is 
beyond doubt. It was truly German. At the same time it must be 
remembered that it was Slavonic as well. 



X. Auspicia, sortesque, 1 ut qui maxime, observant. 
Sortium consuetudo simplex : virgam, frugiferac arbori 
decisam, in surculos amputant, eosque, notis quibusdam 
discretos, super candidam vestem temere ac fortuito 
spargunt : mox, si publice consuletur, sacerdos civitatis, 
sin privatim, ipse paterfamilias, precatus deos, coelum- 
que suspiciens, ter singulos tollit, sublatos, secundum 
impressam ante notam, interpretatur. Si prohibue- 
runt, nulla, de eadem re, in eumdem diem, consultatio : 
sin permissum, auspiciorum adhuc fides exigitur. Et 
illud quidem etiam hie notum, avium voces, volatusque 
interrogare. Proprium gentis, equorum quoque prse- 
sagia ac monitus experiri : publice aluntur iisdem 
nemoribus ac lucis, candidi, et nullo mortali opere 
contacti, quos pressos sacro curru sacerdos, ac rex, vel 
princeps civitatis, comitantur, hinnitusque ac fremitus 
observant. Nee ulli auspicio major fides, non solum 



NOTE ON SECTION X. 57 

apud plebem, seel apucl proceres, apud sacerdotes. Se 
enim ministros deorum, illos conscios putant. Est et 
alia observatio auspiciorum, qua gravium bellorum 
eventus explorant. Ejus gentis, cum qua bellum est, 
captivum quoquo modo interceptum, cum electo popu- 
larium suorum, patriis quemque armis committunt : 
victoria hujus, vel illius, pro prsejudicio accipitur. 

NOTE ON SECTION X. 

1 A uspicia sortesque, <&c] — The use " of lots as connected with 
heathendom, that is, as a means of looking into futurity, continued 
in vogue among the Saxons till a late period, in spite of the efforts 
of the clergy. This is evident from the many allusions in the Pceni- 
tentials, and the prohibitions of the secular law. The augury by 
horses does not appear to have been used in England, from any 
allusion at least which still survives ; but it was still current in 
Germany in the seventh century, and with less change of adjuncts 
than we usually find in the adoption of heathen forms by Christian 
saints. It was left to the decision of horses to determine where the 
mortal remains of St. Gall should rest. The saint would not move 
till certain unbroken horses were brought and charged with his 
coffin ; then, after prayers, we are told, ' Elevato igitur a pontifice 
necnon a sacerdote feretro et equis superposito, ait episcopus. 
" Tollite frena de capitibus eorum/et pergant ubi Dominus voluerit." 
Vexillum ergo crucis cum luminaribus adsumebatur, et psallentes, 
equis prsecedentibus, via incipiebatur.' " — Anon. Vita Sanct. Gall., 
Pertz Monum. ii. 17. — From The Saxons in England, vol. i. p. 429. 



XL De minoribus rebus principes 1 consultant, de 
majoribus omnes : ita tarn en, ut ea quoque, quorum 
penes plebem 2 arbitrium est, apud principes pertra- 
ctentur. Coeunt, nisi quid fortuitum et subitum inci- 
dent, certis diebus, cum aut inchoatur luna, aut imple- 
tur: nam agendis rebus hoc auspicatissimum initium 



58 TI1E GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

credunt. Nee dierum numerum, ut nos, sed noctium 3 
compatant. Sic constituunt, sic condicunt : nox du- 
cere diem videtur. Illud ex libertate vitium, quod 
noil simul, nee ut jussi conveniunt, sed et alter, et 
tertius dies cunctatione coeuntium absumitur. Ut 
turbse placuit, considunt armati. Silentium per sacer- 
dotes, quibus turn et coercendi jus est, imperatur. 
Mox rex, vel princeps, prout a?tas cuique, prout nobi- 
litas, prout decus bellorum, prout facundia est, audiun- 
tur, auctoritate suadendi magis, quam jubendipotestate. 
Si displicuit sententia, fremitu aspernantur: sin placuit, 
frameas concutiunt. Honoratissimum assensus genus 
est, armis laudare. 

NOTES ON SECTION XI. 

1 PrmcipesJ] — The office of the princeps was elective (the election 
taking place at the folc-mot), and probably annual, or for a limited 
period only. His duties were judicial, and the authority extended 
over ten tithings—one hundred. This sufficiently distinguishes him 
from the dux. The most probable German word thus rendered was 
ealdor-man. 

In the historical period the court of the ealdorman of the hun- 
dred was held once a month. Arbitration, and the consideration of 
the extent to which the peace had been kept or broken, was the 
business here — i.e., the prevention rather than the punishment of 
wrong. 

The higher matters belonged to the concilium (folc-mot). 

2 Plebem.] — This, a term far less definite than it was in the eyes 
of a Roman, means all who were, at one and the same time, above 
the rank of servus or liberties (ge-bur, Icet-a or ]>eov), below the rank 
of ingenuus (cepele), and resident on the land. 

Such are the probable limits ; because it is not likely that it ap- 
plied to the ge-styas, or personal retainers of the chief, nor yet to the 
duces, or the order (ce]>elas) out of which they were chosen. 

3 Noctium.] — Of the length of the minor divisions of the month, 



NOTES ON SECTION XI. 59 

in the time of Tacitus, we know nothing : neither can we speculate 
as to the nature of the events on which they were based. 

That the periods, however, found in the text before us (like 
the present word seven-night, se'n-night) which we suppose to have 
been designated by some compound of the word -night, were shorter 
than those of the months, is nearly certain. 

Month is so truly a word of German origin, and so definitely 
connected with moon, that we may safely believe that the natural 
period of twenty-eight days was always recognised, and always called, 
as at present. In other words, it is unlikely that the name for 
month should have been the compound, or combination, of the root 
n-gt in question. 

Still less is it likely that the compound in question was applied 
to a longer period than that of the month. 

That the month then was divided into smaller periods is the fair 
inference from the present passage, — and that the quarters of the 
moon were the phenomena which determined their length, is also 
likely. 

Still the German equivalent to the Roman nundine, and the 
Christian week, is a point which has still to be investigated. 

That such prominence should be given to the reckoning by nights, 
if it merely meant that where a Roman said so many days a German 
said so many nights, is unlikely. There was, surely, some period of 
time designated by the root night -j- either a numeral or some similar 
compositional element. 



XII. Licet apud concilium 1 accusare 2 quoque, et 
discrimen capitis intendere. Distinctio poenarum 3 ex 
delicto : proditores et transfugas arboribus suspendunt : 
ignavos, et imbelles, et corpore infames, coeno ac 
palude, injecta, insuper crate, mergunt. Diversitas 
supplicii illuc respicit, tamquam scelera ostendi opor- 
teat, dum puniuntur, flagitia abscondi. Sed et levi- 
oribus delictis, pro modo, poena : equorum pecorumque 
numero convicti multantur : pars multse 4 regi, vel ci vi- 
tati, pars ipsi qui vindicatur, vel propinquis ejus exsol- 



CO THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

vitur. Eliguntur in iisdem conciliis et principes, qui 
jura per pagos vicosque reddunt. Centeni singulis ex 
plebe co-mites, 5 consilium simul et auctoritas, adsunt. 

NOTES ON SECTION XII. 

1 Concilium.} — The probable name of this was in the Saxon dis- 
tricts, at least some compound of mot =meeting, e.g., ge-mot, or folc-mot. 

Further north it may have been -Ding= concilium. In Scandi- 
navia the word is existing at the present moment in the name of 
the Norwegian parliament, or Stor-ting= great council. 

' Licet apud concilium accusare.] — The concilium here is the 
folcnwt, the question being one not of prevention, or arbitration, but 
of punishment. As such it lay beyond the jurisdiction of the smaller 
court of the hundred. 

In many cases this accusatio was likely to have been made by 
the princeps and his comites, in their capacity of representatives of 
the hundred : indeed, unless we suppose this to have been the case, 
the/oe/i'3e, or right of private revenge, would leave but little in the 
way of criminal jurisdiction to the concilium (folcmote). 

3 Pamarum.~] — The absence of any punishments severer tha,n fines 
for even homicide in the Anglo-Saxon laws has engendered the 
belief that the German laws were mild. 

The horrible cruelty of many of their punishments may be seen 
in Grimm's Deutsche Rechts Alterthiimer. 

4 Pars multce.~\ — Of the two parts into which the penalty fell, that 
which accrued to the state was the wite, that which accrued to the 
individual the wehre. When, over and above the private feud, the 
state interfered, it is likely that the wite became increased. In this 
case the term frio'=peace and ban=ban, or proclamation, came 
into use. 

5 Centeni — comites.'] — The organization here is exactly the opposite 
of that which gives us the mceg-burh {families et propinquitates). 

Instead of the indefinitude involved in the word kin, the number 
here is fixed=100. 

Neighbourhood, too, and locality stand in place of blood and 
descent as the bond. 



NOTES ON SECTION XII. 61 

Of these two elements that of number was the first to become 
obsolete, so that tithings came to contain more or less than 100, as 
the case might be. The second, that of neighbourhood and locality, 
exists at the present time. 

In the country, it would be the area which would have the 
greater tendency to remain fixed and permanent as the character- 
istic element of the tithing and hundred ; in towns it would be the 
number of individuals. 

Hence, in the tenth century we find the following account of the 
municipal equivalent to the hundred : — " This is the ordinance which 
the bishops and the reeves belonging to London have obtained, and 
confirmed with pledges, among our friftgylds, as well eorlish as 
ceorlish, in addition to the doomes which were fixed at Greatley, at 
Exeter, and at Thundersfield. 

" Resolved : that we count every ten men together, and the chief one 
to direct the nine in each of those duties which we have all ordained, 
and afterwards the hyndens of them together, and one hynden man 
who shall admonish the ten for our common benefit ; and let these 
eleven hold the money of the hynden, and decide that they shall 
disburse, when aught is to pay, and what they shall receive, should 
money accrue to us at our common suit. . . . 

" That we gather to us once in every month, if we can, and have 
leisure, the hynden-men, and those who direct the tithings, as well 
with butt-filling, or as else may please us, and know what of our 
agreement has been executed. And let these twelve men have their 
refection together, and feed themselves as they themselves think 
right, and deal the remains of the meal for love of God." 

Upon this, the writer from whom the notice is taken, con- 
tinues : " As this valuable record mentions also territorial tithings, 
containing different amounts of population, it seems to me to furnish 
important confirmation of the conclusion that the gegyldan of Ini 
and iElfred, the members of the London tithings or friogylds of ten, 
and the York tenmantale, are in truth identical. And it is further 
in favour of this view that the citizens called the members of such 
gildships, gegyldan : — 

" And we have also ordained, respecting every man who has given 
his pledge in our gyldships, that should he die, each gyld-brother 
(gegylda) shall give a gesufel-loaf for his soul, and sing a fifty 
(psalms), or cause the same to be sung within xxx days." — Ju- 
dicia Givitatis Londinensis, from Kemble's Saxons in England, vol. i. 



62 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

The following extract illustrates this still further : — " And 
another peace, the greatest of all, there is, whereby all are main- 
tained in firmer state, to wit, in the establishment of a guarantee, 
which the English call a Frv&borgas, with the exception of the men 
of York, who call it Tenmannetale, that is, the number of ten men. 
And it consists in this, that in all the vills throughout the kingdom, 
all men are bound to be in a guarantee by tens, so that if one of the 
ten men offend, the other nine may hold him to right. But if he 
should flee, and they allege that they could not have him to right, 
then should be given them, by the king's justice, a space of at least 
thirty days and one ; and if they could find him they might bring 
him to justice. But for himself, let him out of his own restore the 
damage he has done, or, if the offence be so grave, let justice be done 
upon his body. But if within the aforesaid term he could not be 
found, since in every fribborh there was one headman should take 
two of the best men of his fribborh, and the headman of each of the 
three fribborgs most nearly neighbouring to his own, and likewise 
two of the best in each, if he can have them ; and so with the eleven 
others he shall, if he can, clear both himself and his fribborh, both 
of the offence and flight of the aforesaid malefactor. Which, if he 
cannot do, he shall restore the damage done out of the property of 
the doer, so long as this shall last, and out of his own, and that of 
his friftborh; and they shall make amends to the justice according 
as it shall be by law adjudged them. And, moreover, the oath 
which they could not complete with the venue, the nine themselves 
shall make, viz., they that had no part in the offence. And if at 
any time they can recover him, they shall bring him to the justice, 
if they can, or tell the justice where he is." — Ibid. 



XIII. Nihil autem neque publicse neque privatse 
rei, nisi armati agunt. Sed arma sumere non ante 
cuiquam moris, quam civitas suffecturum probaverit. 
Turn in ipso concilio, vel principum aliquis, vel pater, 
vel propinquus scuto frameaque juvenem ornant : hsec 
apud illos toga, hie primus juventse honos : ante hoc 



NOTE ON SECTION XIII. 63 

domus pars videntur, mox reipublicse. Insignis no- 
bilitas, aut magna patrum merita, principis dignati- 
onem etiain adolescentulis adsignant. Ceteri robusti- 
oribus ac jampridem probatis aggregantur : nee rubor 
inter comites aspici. Gradus quinetiam et ipse comi- 
tates habet, judicio ejus, quern seetantur : magnaque 
et comitum semulatio, quibus primus apud principem 
suum locus; et principum, cui plurimi et acerrimi 
comites. 1 Hsec dignitas, hse vires, magno semper 
electorum juvenum globo circumdari, in pace decus, 
in bello presidium. Nee solum in sua gente cuique, 
sed apud finitimas quoque civitates id nomen, ea gloria 
est, si numero ac virtute comitatus emineat : expe- 
tuntur enim legationibus, et muneribus ornantur, et 
ipsa plerumque fama bella profligant. 

NOTE ON SECTION XIII. 

1 Comitatus — Comites.~\ — The German of this translation was pro- 
bably some older form of the Anglo-Saxon gesift, plural, ge-si- ; 6as= 
retainers. 



XIV. Cum ventum in aciem, turpe principi virtute 
vinci ; turpe comitatui, virtutem principis non ada?- 
quare. Jam vero infame in omnem vitam ac probro- 
sum, superstitem principi suo ex acie recessisse. Ilium 
defendere, tueri, sua quoque fortia facta glorise ejus 
adsignare, prsecipuum sacramentum est. Principes 
pro victoria pugnant : comites pro principe. Si civitas 1 
in qua orti sunt, longa pace et otio torpeat : plerique 
nobilium adolescentium petunt ultro eas nationes, quae 
turn bellum aliquod gerunt; quia et ingrata genti 



G4 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

quies, et facilius inter ancipitia clarescunt, magnumque 
comitatum non nisi vi belloque tueare : exigunt enim 
principis sui liberalitate ilium bellatorera equum, illam 
cruentam victricemque fraraeam. Nam epula?, et 
quamquam incompti, largi tamen apparatus pro sti- 
pendio cedunt. Materia munificentise per bella et 
raptus. Nee arare terram, aut exspectare annum, tam 
facile persuaseris, quam vocare hostes et vulnera me- 
reri : pignim quinimmo et iners videtur sudore adqui- 
rere, quod possis sanguine parare. 

NOTE ON SECTION XIV. 

1 Civitas.] — The likeliest name for the community thus designated, 
is ge-land, the occupants of the same ge-land being ge-landan. 

Many ge-lande might make a ric=kingdom. 

The most probable name for the smaller districts, such as Fosi, 
Chas-uarii, &c, was ge-land : the larger ones, like that of the 
Cherusci, being a ric. 

There is no reason to believe that these free companies (for such 
they really were) limited their offers of service to members of the 
Germanic family only. The utmost in the way of restrictions in 
this respect, which we can suppose them to have laid upon them- 
selves is, that they should not fight against members of the alliance 
to which they belonged, whilst on their own soil. 

The bearing of this upon many questions is important, since it 
invalidates the notion that a German name for a chief is a sufficient 
reason for believing his followers to be Germans. 



XV. Quotiens bella non ineunt, non multum vena- 
tibus ; l plus per otium transigunt, dediti somno, cibo- 
que. Fortissimus quisque ac bellicosissimus nihil 
agens, delegata domus et penatium et agrorum cura 
feminis senibusque, et infirmissimo cuique ex familia, 



NOTE ON SECTION XV. 65 

ipsi hebent : mira diversitate naturae, cum iidem ho- 
mines sic ament inertiam, et oderint quietem. Mos 
est civitatibus ultro ac viritim conferre principibus vel 
armentorum vel frugum, quod pro honore acceptum, 
etiam necessitatibus subvenit. Gaudent prsecipue fini- 
timarum gentium donis, quae non modo a singulis, sed 
publico mittuntur : electi equi, magna arma, phalerse, 
torquesque. Jam et pecuniam accipere docuimus. 

NOTE ON SECTION XV. 

1 Venatibus.~\ — This is a measure of the extent to which the Ger- 
mans were exclusively agricultural — at least agricultural as opposed 
to populations in the hunter-state. 

Probably, except in the Marks, there was less game in Germany 
in the time of Tacitus than there is now. 



XVI. Nullas Germanorum populis urbes 1 babitari, 
satis notum est, ne pati quidem inter se junctas sedes. 
Colunt discreti ac diversi, ut fons, ut campus, ut nemus 
placuit. Vicos locant, non in nostrum morem, con- 
nexis et cohserentibus aedificiis : suam quisque domum 
spatio circumdat, sive adversus casus ignis remedium, 
sive inscitia sedificandi. Ne csementorum quidem 
apud illos aut tegularum usus ; materia ad omnia 
utuntur informi, et citra speciem aut delectationem. 
Qusedam loca diligentiiis illinunt terra ita pura ac 
splendente, ut picturam ac lineamenta colorum imi- 
tetur. Solent et subterraneos specus aperire, eosque 
multo insuper fimo onerant, suffugium hiemi et re- 
ceptaculum frugibus : quia rigorem frigorum ejusmodi 
locis molliunt: et si quando hostis advenit, aperta 
populatur : abdita autem et defossa, aut ignorantur, 
aut eo ipso fallunt, quod quserenda sunt. 

F 



THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 



NOTE ON SECTION XVI. 



1 Nullas — urbes^\ — Exceptions must be made to this statement, if 
we give much importance to the assertion that numerous nations on 
the Gallic side of the Rhine were Germans — e.g., the Nemeles, Van- 
giones, Triboci, Treviri, &c. In all the districts belonging to these 
so-called Germans, there were considerable towns. Of course, these 
may have been Gallic, whilst the country was German. 

As for the text itself, it must be looked upon as having reference 
to the well-known passage in Coasar, rather than as a piece of separate 
and independent evidence. 

The intercourse with the Hermundorum civitas (§41) by no 
means implies the existence of a town or city. A periodical fair on 
the Danube will give us all the phenomena implied by the passage 
in question. 



XVII. Tegumen omnibus sagum, fibula, aut, si desit, 
spina, consertum: cetera intecti, totos dies juxta focum 
atque ignem agunt. Locupletissimi veste distinguuntur, 
non fluitante, sicut Sarmatse ac Parthi, sed stricta et 
singulos artus exprimente. Gerunt et ferarum pelles, 1 
proximi ripse negligenter, ulteriores exquisitius, ut 
quibus nullus per commercia cultus. Eligunt feras, 
et detracta velamina spargunt maculis pellibusque 
belluarum, quas exterior Oceanus, atque ignotum mare 
gignit. Nee alius feminis quam viris habitus, nisi 
quod feminse ssepius lineis amictibus velantur, eosque 
purpura variant, partemque vestitus superioris in ma- 
nicas non extendunt, nudse brachia ac lacertos : sed et 
proxima pars pectoris patet. 

NOTE ON SECTION XVII." 

1 Ferarum pelles.] — Whether the word leather be of Germanic 
or Keltic origin is uncertain. 



NOTE ON SECTION XVII. 67 

The oldest exhumations have presented a body wrapped in skin, 
in a rude, coffin-shaped, rough-hewed tree. The dress, as described 
in the present passage, consists of hides ; both as leather and furs. 
For the latter, Scandinavia was famous in the seventh century. 
" Alia vero gens ibi moratur Suethans, quae velut Thuringi, equis 
utuntur eximiis. Hi quoque sunt, qui in usus Romanorum Saphi- 
rinas pelles commercio interveniente per alias innumeras gentes 
transmittunt, famosi pellium decora nigredine. Hi quum inopes 
vivunt, ditissime vestiuntur." — Jornand. De Reb. Get. c. 3. 

The long flowing dresses of the Sarmatians were chiefly made by 
the process of felting, those of the Parthian s, by that of weaving ; 
ivool being the chief material of the former, wool, cotton, and even silk 
of the latter. 



XVIII. Quamquam severa illic matrimonia : 1 nee 
ullam morum partem niagis lauclaveris: nam prope 
soli barbarorum singulis uxoribus contenti sunt : ex- 
ceptis admodum paucis, qui non libidine, sed ob nobi- 
litatem plurimis nuptiis ambiuntur. Dotem non uxor 
marito, sed uxori maritus ofFert. Intersunt parentes. 
et propinqui, ac munera probant : munera non ad deli- 
cias muliebres qusesita, nee quibus nova nupta comatur; 
sed boves et frenatum equum, et scutum cum framea 
gladioque. In hsec munera uxor accipitur : atque 
invicem ipsa armorum aliquid viro affert : hoc maxi- 
mum vinculum, hsec arcana sacra, hos conjugates deos 
arbitrantur. Ne se mulier extra virtutum cogitati- 
ones, extraque bellorum casus putet, ipsis incipientis 
matrimonii auspiciis admonetur, venire se laborum 
periculorumque sociam, idem in pace, idem in proelio 
passuram ausuramque; hoc juncti boves, hoc paratus 
equus, hoc data anna denuntiant. Sic vivendum, sic 
pereundum : accipere se quse liberis inviolata ac 

F 2 



G8 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

digna reddat, qua? nurus accipiant, rursusque ad nepotes 
referant. 

NOTE ON SECTION XVIII. 

1 Severa — matrimonial] — A measure of the consideration in which 
females were held, may be found in the Codex Diplomaticus. 

A widow had the power of devising her land. A son having 
brought an action against his mother in the Anglo-Saxon County 
Court, was, upon the latter receiving notification thereof, disinherited 
by her on the spot, and that in the following words : — " Here sitteth 
Leoflsed my kinswoman, unto whom I grant both my land and my 
gold, and gown, and dress, and all that I own, after my day 
(death)." " Her sit LeofUed min maege, (5e ic ge-ann aeg<5er ge mines 
landes, ge mines goldes, ge hroagles, ge reafes, ge ealles fte ic ah, 
aefter minon dajge." 

Nay more, there was one sort of property, at least, which a mar- 
ried woman might bequeath even during the life-time of her husband. 
This was the morning-gift (morgengifu), presented to her by her 
husband, the morning after the consummation of her marriage. " In 
several wills, the husband carefully points out the lands to which 
his wife has this claim ; and, in several cases, women appeal to it as 
their title to lands which they are desirous of alienating." — Kemble, 
Codex Diplomaticus, vol. 1, cix., ex. 



XIX. Ergo septa pudicitia agunt, nullis spectacu- 
lorum inlecebris, nullis conviviorura inritationibus 
corrupts. Literamm secreta viri pariter ac feminse 
ignorant, 1 Paucissima in tam numerosa gente adul- 
teria, quorum poena prsesens, et maritis permissa. 
Accisis crinibus, nudatam, coram propinquis, expellit 
domo maritus, ac per omnem vicum verbere agit : 
publicatae enim pudicitise nulla venia : non forma, 
non setate, non opibus maritum invenerit. Nemo 
enim illic vitia ridet : nee corrumpere et corrumpi, 
sasculum vocatur. Melius quidem aclhuc ea3 civi- 



NOTE ON SECTION XIX. 69 

tates, in quibus tantum virgines nubunt, et cum spe 
votoque uxoris semel transigitur. Sic uuura acci- 
piunt maritum, quo modo unum corpus, unamque 
vitam, ne ulla cogitatio ultra, ne longior cupiditas, 
ne tamquam maritum, sed tamquam matrimonium 
anient. Numerum liberorum finire, aut quemquam 
ex agnatis necare, flagitium habetur: plusque ibi boni 
mores valent, quam alibi bonse leges. 

NOTE ON SECTION XIX. 

1 Literarum secreta — ignorant.'] — The Moeso-Gothic alphabet of 
the Goths of the third century was formed upon the Greek. 

The Anglo-Saxon alphabet, the next in point of antiquity, was 
Roman in origin. 

It is only by exaggerating the antiquity of the inscriptions called 
Runic, that any exception can be taken to the literal interpretation 
of the passage. Yet the oldest Runic inscription is subsequent to 
the year a.d. 800. 

Run=sulcus=furrow ; and this interpretation well explains their 
nature. The Runic letters were fitted for being cut on wood or stone 
— not written. Consequently, they were available only for com- 
paratively short inscriptions. 

But run=mysterium=secret as well. I imagine this to be a 
power deduced from the earlier signification —letter, the earliest 
being furrow. 



XX. In omni domo nudi ac sordidi, in hos artus, in 
hsec corpora, quae miramur, excrescunt. Sua quemque 
mater uberibus alit, nee ancillis ac nutricibus delegan- 
tur. Dominum ac servum nullis educationis deliciis 
dignoscas. Inter eadem pecora, in eadem humo 
degunt, donee Eetas separet ingenuos, virtus agnoscat. 
Sera juvenum Venus ; 1 eoque inexhausta pubertas : 



70 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

nec virgines festinantur; eadem juventa, similis pro- 
ceritas : pares validseque miscentur : ac robora paren- 
tum liberi referunt. Sororum filiis idem apud avun- 
culum, qui apud patrem honor. Quidam sanctiorem 
arctioremque hunc nexum sanguinis arbitrantur, et in 
accipiendis obsidibus magis exigunt ; tamquam ii, et 
animum firmius, et donium latiiis teneant. Heredes 
tamen successoresque sui cuique liberi : et nullum 
testamentum. Si liberi non sunt, proximus gradus in 
possessione fratres, patrui, avunculi. Quanto plus 
propinquorum, quo major adfinium numerus, tanto 
gratiosior senectus : nec ulla orbitatis pretia. 

NOTE ON SECTION XX. 

1 St ra juvenum Ve?ius.~\ — Whatever may have been the age of 
puberty, that of infancy (in the legal sense of the term) ended with 
the Anglo-Saxon at 12. 

At that time the youth was mxmdig, i.e., his own master, or at 
least responsible. 



XXI. Suscipere tam inimicitias, 1 seu patris, seu pro- 
pinqui, quam amicitias necesse est : nec implacabiles 
durant. Luitur enim etiam homicidium certo armen- 
torum ac pecorum numero, recipitque satisfactionem 
uni versa domus : uti liter in publicum ; quia periculo- 
siores sunt inimicitise juxta libertatem. Convictibus 
et hospitiis non alia gens effusius indulget. Quem- 
cumque mortalium arcere tecto, nefas habetur : pro 
fortuna quisque apparatis epulis excipit. Cum defe- 
cere, qui modo liospes fuerat, monstrator hospitii et 
comes, proximam domum non invitati adeunt: nec 
interest: pari humanitate accipiuntur. Notumjgno- 



NOTE ON SECTION XXL 71 

tumque, quantum ad jus hospitii, nemo discernit. 
Abeunti, si quid poposcerit, concedere moris: et 
poscendi invicem eadem facilitas. Gaudent muneri- 
bus : sed nee data imputant, nee acceptis obligantur. 

NOTE ON SECTION XXI. 

1 Suscipere — inimicitias.~\ — The liability of private quarrels, and, 
perhaps, even the recognition of the right of private warfare in- 
volved in this custom, appears at the beginning of the legal period 
under some form of the root /-ft. 

In the Frisian Laws (xi. 2), the form is fceh$e=feud. 

FaebSe itself is a derivation of fd=foe. — Saxons in England 
chap. x. 



XXII. Victus inter hospites comis. ' Statim e so- 
mno, quern plerumque in diem extrahunt, lavantur, 1 
ssepius calida, ut apud quos plurimum hiems occupat. 
Lauti, cibum capiunt : separatee singulis sedes, et sua 
cuique mensa. Turn ad negotia, nee minus ssepe ad 
convivia procedunt armati. Diem noctemque con- 
tinuare potando, nulli probrum. Crebrse, ut inter 
vinolentos rixee, raro conviciis, ssepius csede et vulne- 
ribus transiguntur. Sed et de reconciliandis invicem 
inimicis, et jungendis adfinitatibus, et adsciscendis 
principibus, de pace denique ac bello plerumque in 
conviviis consultant: tamquam nullo magis tempore 
aut ad simplices cogitationes pateat animus, aut ad 
magnas incalescat. Gens non astuta, nee callida, 
aperit adhuc secreta pectoris, licentia, joci. Ergo de- 
tecta et nuda omnium mens, postera, die retractatur ; 
et salva utriusque temporis ratio est. Deliberant, 
dum fingere nesciunt : constituunt, dum errare non 
possunt. 



72 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 



NOTE ON SECTION XXII. 



1 Lavantur.] — The use of the bath is recognised throughout the 
Old Norse Saeras. 



XXIII. Potui humor ex hordeo aut frumento, in 
quamdam similitudinem vini corruptus. 1 Proximi ripec 
et vinum mercantur. Cibi simplices : agrestia poma, 
recens fera, aut lac coucretum. Sine apparatu, sine 
blandimentis expellunt famem. Adversus sitim, non 
eadem temperantia. Si indulseris ebrietati, sugge- 
rendo quantum concupiscunt, baud minus facile vitiis, 
quam armis vincentur. 



NOTE ON SECTION XXIII. 



1 Humor ex hordeo aut frumento — corruptusl\ — Both the words 
ale and beer are of Germanic origin. The Keltic term, on the other 
hand, is cwmv=ccrevisia, from the Latin. 



XXIV. Genus spectaculorum unum, atque in omni 
coetu idem. Nudi juvenes, quibus id ludicrum est, 
inter gladios se, atque infestas frameas, saltu jaciunt. 
Exercitatio artem paravit, ars decorem : non in quas- 
stum tamen, aut mercedem : quamvis audacis lascivise 
pretium est, voluptas spectantium. Aleam (quod mi- 
rere) sobrii inter seria exercent, tanta lucrandi per- 
dendive temeritate, ut, cum omnia defecerunt, ex- 
tremo ac novissimo jactu de libertate et de corpore 
contendant. Victus voluntariam servitutem 1 adit: 
quamvis junior, quamvis robustior, alligari se ac venire 



NOTES ON SECTIONS XXIV. AND XXV. 73 

patitur. Ea est in re prava pervicacia : ipsi ficlem 
vocant. Servos conclitionis hujus per commercia tra- 
dunt, ut se quoque pudore victorise exsolvant. 

NOTE ON SECTION XXIV. 

1 Voluntariam servitutem.~\ — This must have been servitude applied 
to offices attached to the, person not to the land — at least if the sug- 
gestion of the next note be correct. 



XXV. Ceteris servis, non, in nostrum morera, de- 
scriptis per familiam ministeriis, utuntur. Suam quis- 
que sedem, 1 suos penates regit. Frumenti modum 
dominus, aut pecoris, aut vestis, ut colono, injungit: 
et servus hactenus paret. Cetera domiis officia uxor 
ac liberi exsequuntur. Verberare servum ac vinculis 
et opere coercere, rarum. Occidere solent, non disci- 
plina, et severitate, sed impetu et ira, ut inimicum, 
nisi quod impune. Libertini 2 non multum supra ser- 
vos sunt, raro aliquod momentum in domo, numquam 
in civitate, exceptis dumtaxat iis gentibus, quae re- 
gnantur. Ibi enim et super ingenuos et super nobiles 
ascendunt : apud ceteros, impares libertini libertatis' 



NOTES ON SECTION XXV. 

1 Suam quisque sedem.'] — Quisque, i.e., servus. — This was, in 
reality, an adscriptio glebw ; the slave belonging to the land, and, 
by a parity of reasoning, not sufficiently recognized by the generality 
of writers on the subject, the land (to a certain degree) belonged to 
the slave. 

Unless we suppose the smallest free cultivator to have had slaves 
under him (as unlikely a doctrine as that the smallest freehold 
farmer in England has a regular set of labourers attached to his 



74 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

land), the system of land cultivated for a landlord who took no 
part in the work, and the system of land cultivated by the holders 
themselves must have been in the inverse ratio to each other. 

Probably, the land of the latter sort was commonest in the coun- 
tries which had been independent from the first ; the latter in those 
wherein conquests had occurred — the servl, in the sense of the pre- 
sent section, being the original owners. 

At any rate, an inordinate proportion of land thus cultivated by 
servl for an idle, and probably non-resident class (of, perhaps, fight- 
ing men), is incompatible with the evolution of free institutions. 

Slavery then, I think, was an exceptionable case in Germany. 

The probable name for the servus of the section was ge-bur=bauer 
=peasant. 

2 Libertini.~\ — It is true that manumission occurs in the earliest 
Anglo-Saxon charters. 

But it is also true that the earliest of these are later than the 
introduction of Christianity. 

I cannot, then, think that UbeHus=.manumitted slave. 

More probably, the servus of Tacitus, was a dependent attached 
to the land (prcedial); the libertus one attached to the person 
[personal). 

The name may have been lest, PI. Icet-as = leute in Modern 
German. 

Of these — the younger individuals may have been knav-as, 
knap-as, knecht-s = knaves = knights ; the humbler in point of 
occupation, ]>eav-as=thieves. 



XXVI. Ferms agitare, 1 et in usuras extenclere, 
ignotum : ideoque magis servatur quam si vetitum es- 
set. Agri, pro numero cultorum, ab universis per vices 2 
occupantur, quos mox inter se secundum dignationem 
partiuntur : facilitatem partiendi camporum spatia 
prsestant. Arva per annos mutant ; et superest ager : 
nee enim cum ubertate et amplitudine soli labore 



NOTES ON SECTION XXVI. 75 

contendunt, ut pomaria conserant, et prata separent, 
et hortos rigent : sola terra? seges imperatur. Uncle 
annum quoque ipsum non in totidem digerunt spe- 
cies : hiems, et ver, et sestas intellectum ac vocabula 
habent : autumni perinde nomen ac bona ignorantur. 

NOTES ON SECTION XXVI. 

1 Fenus agitare.] — The extent to which the author of Germania 
made its ethnology secondary to the moral effect of contrasting 
simple and hardy Germany with artificial and luxurious Rome may 
be measured by the passage. No mere geographer, or ethnologist, 
would devote a chapter to saying there was no usury, when he had 
previously said there was no money. 

The last sentence of § 19, comes under the remark. 

Each is a negative statement, which would not be made except a 
contrast were intended with some country where the customs were 
but too common. 

2 Pro numero cultorum — per vices.] — It is only by fresh divisions 
that land, once apportioned amongst a certain number of cultivators, 
can remain in any permanent relation to the number of those cul- 
tivators. 

Again : it is only by an increase of either land, or the product of 
land, proportionate to the increase of population, that the respective 
competences of the cultivators can remain the same. 

Hence the words pro numero cultorum create a difficulty, which is 
enhanced by the words per vices. 

Mox. — This is the most difficult word of the section. Per vices 
implies change from one set of holders to another ; and mox — par- 
tiuntur does more. It denotes a change from a system of periodical 
transfers to one of permanent appropriation. 

First comes a season when land shifts from owner to owner ; next 
one wherein it passes to a permanent state of individual or joint 
property. 

Agri. — This, I think, has a double import, according to its relation. 

a. As opposed to arva it means land in grass, wood, or fen, in 
contradistinction to land under the plough. 

6. As opposed to land which has been divided and apportioned, it 
means land ziwapportioned or undivided. 



70 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

Agri p7-o numero, &c. — The proper commentator upon this diffi- 
cult section is some conveyancer learned in ethnology, rather than a 
simple ethnologist. 

The separate words, however, must first be considered. 

Arva. — Arable land. 

Per annos. — Annually ; every year. 

Mutant. — From a crop to a fallow; not from one holder to 
another. 

Superest. — Stands over to spare; is abundant — as neferrumqui- 
dem superest (§ 6) = There is no excess even of iron. 

Sola — seges. — Corn (wheat and barley, § 23), to the exclusion of 
green crops, pulse, and vegetables. 

Iliems, et ver, et cestas. — Winter, spring (for-aar Danish, fruh- 
jahr German =■ for-year), and summer. Such are the only Germanic 
names of the seasons, even in the present English ; autumn being of 
Latin origin. Fall (in America), back-end (in more than one pro- 
vincial dialect), and harvest are all — though of native origin — recent 
terms. 

I cannot realize the nature of the tenure here noticed. The 
limited tenure expressed by per vices cannot well have consisted in a 
certain allotment as private property, accompanied by a certain 
share in an undivided common ; though such has been the view of 
careful writers. 

The word mox complicates this view. For the occupation in the 
first instance (pro numero cultorum, ab universis per vices) we find 
no trace of individual possession ; for that in the second (partitio 
secundum dignitatem) none of joint ownership. Yet mox implies 
that the two forms were successive rather than simultaneous. 

That there was much joint occupancy, except on the Marches, I 
am slow to believe. The house, at least, was permanent. So must 
the farms occupied by the servi of § 25 have been. The whole 
tenor of German history goes the same way. 

It is safe, then, to hold with Mr. Kemble, that when the Germans 
"changed the arable year to year, there was land to spare," that is, 
for commons, " and pasture ; but it does not amount to a proof that 
settled property in land was not part of the Teutonic scheme ; it 
implies no more than this, that within the Mark, which was the 
property of all, what was this year one man's cornland might the 
next be another man's fallow ; a process very intelligible to those 
who know anything of the system of cultivation, yet prevalent in 



NOTES ON SECTION XXVL 77 

parts of Germany, or have ever had interest in what we call Lammas 
Meadows." 

This even seems too much — to say nothing about the difficulty 
attached to the words another man's fallow. "What could such a 
fallow be? Not for corn; since the land had been cropped by the 
previous owner. Not for a green crop ; since there were none such 
known. Not for the herbage, i.e., the weeds and after-growth of the 
harvest, which, in some parts, of England, is worth from two to 
three shillings per acre. The harvests of Germany are too late for 
this. 

I think that the sentence of Tacitus has so little to do with the 
tenure of land at all, that it must be taken with what follows rather 
than with what precedes; in which case it applies to the husbandry 
only — not to the laws of landed property. 

Nothing but corn was grown. This was new to an Italian : who 
had seen vetches, flax, and so many other products taken off the 
same land in either succession or rotation. As a consequence of 
this — 

There was no such thing as a second crop on the same land with- 
out an interval. 

This was also new to an Italian. The abundance of land, how- 
ever, allows it. 

As far, then, as the present passage goes, the arvum, which has 
just borne a crop, although left to nature, is as much the property 
of the original owner, in the intervals between two tilths, as it was 
during the seed-time and harvest. 

The difficulties connected with the tenure of the land it neither 
removes nor increases. 

By considering the statement as one for which C'cesar rather 
than Tacitus is responsible, and by limiting the account in Csesar to 
the occupancy of the lands of the Sequani, dispossessed by Ariovistus, 
we approach a solution. 

We are, then, at liberty to consider an occupation which is at one 
and the same time imperfect, and temporary, in the light of abnor- 
mal tenure, adapted to the country of a conquered enemy only. Yet, 
even then, the details are remarkable. Was the occupatio per vices, 
a mere quartering of successive bodies of warriors (warriors only) 
upon recently invaded, and imperfectly subdued districts, and the 
subsequent partitio, the distribution of the land of such districts 
after the conquest had become complete, the possession assured, and 



78 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

the conversion of chieftains and captains into comparatively peace- 
able settlers had become practicable? Such a view would best 
reconcile Caesar's statement with probability. 



XXVII. Funerura nulla ambitio : id solum ob- 
servatur, ut corpora clarorum virorum certis lignis 
crementur. 1 Struem rogi nee vestibus, nee odoribus 
cumulant : sua cuique arma, quorumdam igni et equus 
adjicitur. Sepulcrum cespes erigit. Monumentorum 
arduum et operosum honorem, ut gravem defunctis, 
aspernantur. Lamenta ac lacrimas cito, dolorem et 
tristitiam tarde ponunt. Feminis lugere honestum 
est : viris meminisse. 

NOTE ON SECTION XXVII. 

1 Crementur.] — The classification of the modern archaeologists, 
founded upon that of the early Icelandic historians, divides by a 
pretty broad line of demarcation two periods. 

a. In one the dead were burned. 

b. In the other the dead were buried. 

That the burning-time came down as late as the time of Tacitus 
is shown by the present passage. 



XXVIII. Hsec in commune de omnium Germano- 
rum origine ac moribus accepimus. Nunc singularum 
gentium instituta, ritusque, quatenus differant, quae 
nationes e Germania in Gallias commigraverint, expe- 
diam. Validiores olim 1 Gallorum res fuisse summus 
auctorum divus Julius tradit : eoque credibile est, 
etiam Gallos in Germaniam transgressos. Quantulum 
enim amnis obstabat, quominus, ut quseque gens eva- 



NOTES ON SECTION XXVIIL 79 

luerat, occuparet permutaretque secies promiscuas ad- 
huc, et nulla regnorum potentia divisas ? Igitur inter 
Hercyniam silvam, Rhenumque et Moenum amnes, 
Helvetii, 2 ulteriora Boii, Gallica utraque gens, tenuere. 
Manet adhuc Boiemi nomen, 3 significatque loci ve- 
terem memoriam, quamvis mutatis cultoribus. Sed 
utrum Aravisci 4 in Pannoniam ab Osis, Germanorum 
natione, 5 an Osi ab Araviscis 6 in Germaniam commi- 
graverint, cum eodem adhuc sermone, institutis, mo- 
ribus utantur, incertum est: quia pari olim inopia 
ac libertate, eadem utriusque ripse bona malaque 
erant. Treviri 7 et Nervii 8 circa affectationem Germa- 
nicse originis ultro ambitiosi sunt, tamquam per hanc 
gloriam sanguinis, a similitudine et inertia Gallorum 
separentur. Ipsam Rheni ripam haud dubie Germa- 
norum populi colunt, Vangiones, 9 Triboci, 10 Nemetes. 11 
Ne Ubii 12 quidem, quamquam Romana colonia esse 
meruerint, ac libentius Agrippinenses conditoris sui 
nomine vocentur, origine erubescunt, trangressi olim, 
et experimento fidei super ipsam Rheni ripam col- 
locati, ut arcerent, non ut custodirentur. 

NOTES ON SECTION XXVIII. 

1 Validiores olim, &c] — The chief passage in Csesar is to be 
found in p. lxxxvii {Prolegomena) — acfuit antea tempus, &c. 

Criticism of the passage will separate the statement for which 
Csesar, speaking upon his own knowledge, is responsible, from 
those which must be referred to his Gallic informants — these last 
speaking perhaps from history, perhaps from tradition, perhaps from 
inference, perhaps on no grounds at all beyond the wish to contrast 
their present inferiority to the Germans, with some more glorious 
epoch, when Gaul was the powerful, and Germany the weak coun- 
try, when the Gauls encroached, and the Germans retreated. 
Such a time may have been a reality. It may also have been a 
dream. 



80 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

That there was, at least, one body of Gauls on the German side 
of the Rhine, is a fact to which we have Caesar as a witness. His 
language respecting the Volcae Tectosages, is that of a man speaking 
to what he knows at first-hand. 

For the locality of such Trans-Rkenane Gauls, in the time of 
Caesar, no district has a better claim than Baden and Wurtem- 
burg — the agri Decimates of Tacitus. We come to this con- 
clusion by the exclusive method. It was not Switzerland, for 
that was Helvetian ; nor yet the Middle Rhine, since, in those 
parts, there seems to have been Germans of the Alemannic 
division. 

The import of the name Volcce Tectosages is by no means clear. 
Of the two words composing it, the former ( Volcce) was generic, the 
latter (Tectosages) specific ; since, besides the division in question, 
there was a second — the Voices Arecomici. 

The area of the Volcee of Gaul in general seems to have been the 
parts between the Rhone and the Pyrenees ; but as the name was 
probably collective rather than special, the history of the Volcce of 
Gaul is obscure. Caesar mentions them only incidentally. 

How the Gauls beyond the Rhine came thither is another ques- 
tion. They may have done so by simple intrusion, i.e., just as 
Ctesar was told they did. This intrusion may have been either 
early or late — as late as the times approaching those of Caesar 
himself, or earlier than the well-known migration — real or sup- 
posed — described by Livy, and referred to the reign of Tarquinius 
Priscus. — Lib. v. 34, 35. 

" De transitu in Italiam Gallorum hsec accepimus. Prisco Tar- 
quinio Roinse regnante, Celtarum, qua? pars Galliae tertia est, penes 
Bituriges summa imperii fuit : ii regem Celtico dabant. Ambi- 
gatus is fuit, virtute fortunaque cum sua, turn publica, praepollens, 
quod imperio ejus Gallia adeo frugum hominumque fertilis fuit, ut 
abundans multitudo vix regi videretur posse. Hie magno natu 
ipse jam, exonerare praegravante turba regnum cupiens, Bellovesum 
ac Sigovesum, sororis filios, impigros juvenes, missurum se esse, in 
quas dii dedissent auguriis sedes, ostendit. Quantum ipsi vellent, 
numerum hominum excirent, ne qua gens arcere advenientes posset. 
Turn Sigoveso sortibus dati Hercynii saltus : Belloveso haud paullo 
laatiorem in Italiam viam dii dabant. 

" Is, quod ejus ex populis abundabat, Bituriges, Arvernos, 
Senones, iEduos, Ambarros, Carnutes, Aulercos, excivit. Profectus, 



NOTES ON SECTION XXVIII. 81 

ingentibus pedituni equitumque copiis, in Tricastinos venit. Per 
Taurinos saltusque invios Alpes transcenderunt : fusisque acie Tuscis 
haud procul Ticino flumine, quum, in quo consederanfc, agrum 
Insubrium appellari audissent cognomine Insubribus pago iEduorum, 
ibi, omen sequentes loci, condidere urbem: Mediolanum appellarunt. 

" Alia subinde manus Cenomanorum, Elitovio duce, vestigia 
priorum secuta, eodeni saltu, favente Belloveso, quum transcendisset 
Alpes, ubi nunc Brixia ac Verona urbes sunt (locos tenuere Libui) 
considunt. 

" Post bos Salluvii prope antiquam gentem Laevos Ligures, in- 
colentes circa Ticinum amnem. 

" Penino deinde Boii Lingonesque transgressi, quum jam inter 
Padum atque Alpes omnia tenerentur, Pado ratibus trajecto, non 
Etruscos modo, sed etiam Umbros agro pellunt : intra Apenninum 
tamen sese tenuere. 

" Turn Senones, -recentissimi advenarum, ab Utente flumine 
usque ad iEsim fines babuere. Hanc gentem Clusium, Romamque 
inde, venisse comperio." 

To this add the following passage from Polybius : — 

Tavra -ye ra Tred'ia to iraXaidv eve\jlovto Tvpprjvoi . . o'iq etti/ul- 
yvvfxevoL Kara. Ti]v Trapddsrnv KeXrot, Kal irspl to tcdXXog Ttjc x^pag 
ocpdaXfAidaavTEs, ek fiiKpdg Tpofda-ecoc [xsydXr] arpariq 7rapae>o£wc 
etteXBovteq, E^i^aXov ek tt\q Trepi tov Tldciov ywp a £ Tvpprjvovg Kal 
KarE^ov avrol to. TTEcila. Ta fiiy ovv TvpHJra Kal irspl Tag avaroXdc 
tov Hdcov KEi/jLEia Adoi Kal Ae€ekloi, jjurd Se tovtovq "Lcro/JL^pEg 
KaTfOKriaav, o fiiyiarrov 'idvng y)v avrutv, l^ijc c!e tovtoiq ivapd tov 
iroTafidv Y^Evo^idvoi' Td Si irpog tov 'AEpiav i]()r) irpoarjKovTa yivog 
dXXo irdvv iraXawv SiaKaria^, irpo&ayopEvovTai he Qvevetoi . . Ta 
8e Trepav tov Tldciov Td KEpl tov'Kttevvivov TrpuiToi fxev " Avavsg, ^uera 

()£ TOVTOVQ BoiOl KaTWKTJffaV !£?}£ $E TOVTUfV WQ TtpOQ TOV 'AciptCU' 

A'iyo)VEQ' tu cje TsXevTala Trpog SaXaTTr) ^,{]vu)veg — Polyb. ii. 17. 

Assuming all this to be not only history, but the history of what may 
be called the First Gallic Migration, the Trans-Pthenane Gauls are 
accounted for. They are the descendants of the Gauls of Sigovesus. 

But neither Polybius' nor Livy's account can well be considered 
historical. Where were the records for the time in question 1 The 
most that can be done in the way of connecting the Trans-Rhenane 
Gauls of Csesar with the Gauls of Sigovesus, is to admit the common 
character of the tradition that applied to them. 

But what if the Gauls of the right bank of the Rhine were no 



82 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

intruders at all ? What if they represented an originally Keltic 
population of south-western Germany 1 What if the Germans had 
been the encroachers 1 In this case our view changes ; and they are 
the fragments of an old, rather than the rudiments of a new popula- 
tion, and the account of their migration is no tradition but an 
■inference ; an inference drawn from their eccentric locality, an infer- 
ence which accounts for their outlying position, an inference in- 
correct, in fact, but an inference natural to imperfect speculators 
in ethnology. 

I give no opinion as to how far this is likely to have been the 
case ; the question it involves being one of great compass and subtilty ; 
resting, as it does, upon some of the highest generalizations of the 
phenomena of human distribution and human migration. 

The history — real or supposed — of these Tectosages is curious. 
The following account is in the words of Niebuhr. 

" In the spring of the year after this, Cn. Manlius Vulso, the suc- 
cessor of L. Cornelius Scipio, anxious for an opportunity to undertake 
something from which he might derive fame and wealth — a desire 
which is henceforward the prevailing characteristic of the Roman 
generals — made a campaign against the Galatians, or Gallo-Grasci, 
in Phrygia. In the time of Pyrrhus, these Gauls had penetrated 
through Macedonia into Greece, as far as Delphi ; afterwards they 
went eastward to Thrace ; but whether they were, as the Greeks 
relate, induced to do so by fearful natural phenomena, or were 
attracted by reports about the delightful countries of Asia, is un- 
certain. Many remained in Thrace, and ruled over the country ; 
but others, twenty thousand in number, crossed over into Asia, in 
two divisions, the one going across the Hellespont, and the other 
across the Bosporus, and their enterprise was facilitated by the feuds 
of the Asiatic princes. There they settled on the northern coast, in 
the territory about Ancyra, in Phrygia, just as, at a later period, the 
Normans did in Neustria. They inhabited thirty-three towns, in a 
country which, though it seems to have been destined by Providence 
to be one of the most flourishing and happy in the world, is now, 
under the despotism of barbarians, like an accursed desert. They 
consisted of three tribes, bearing the strange names of Trocmi, 
Tolistoboii, and Tectosagse. The first two seem to have been formed 
during their wanderings, for they are not mentioned elsewhere. 
They united with the Bithynians, where two small kingdoms were 
growing up. The Bithynians were Thracians settled between Nico- 



NOTES ON SECTION XXVIII. 83 

media and Heraclea ; during the time of the Persian dominion they 
were governed by native princes, and after the dissolution of the 
Persian and Macedonian empires, the latter of which had always 
been least consolidated in Asia Minor, they extended themselves, 
and acquired considerable importance. Nicomedes, then king, took 
those Gauls into his pay, there being then only ten thousand armed 
men among them, defeated his rival, and founded the Bithynian 
state, which gradually became Hellenised. From that time, the 
Gauls sold their services to any one who might seek them, and made 
the whole of western Asia tributary to themselves. Their history is 
yet in great confusion ; but it can be cleared up, many materials 
existing for it. They were defeated by Antiochus Soter, whereupon 
they withdrew into the mountains, whence they afterwards burst 
forth whenever circumstances allowed them, and all the neighbour- 
ing nations paid tribute, to escape their devastations. But when 
the war between Ptolemy Euergetes and Seleucus Callinicus, and 
afterwards that between the former and Antiochus Hierax broke 
out, they showed themselves thoroughly faithless, selling themselves 
sometimes to the one, sometimes to the other, and were the scourge 
of all Asia, until, to the amazement of every body, Attalus of Per- 
gamus refused to pay tribute, attacked and defeated them, a fact 
which can be accounted for only on the supposition, that through 
idleness they had become quite effeminate and unwarlike, like the 
Goths whom Belisarius found in Italy. They never entirely re- 
covered from this blow, though they still continued to exercise 
considerable influence, for Asia was always divided ; and although 
Antiochus was staying in those countries, he was too much occupied 
to turn his attention to them, and would not, moreover, have been 
able to protect that part of Phrygia bordering on the district inha- 
bited by the Gauls. Hence they still levied tribute far and wide, 
and after the fall of Antiochus, the Asiatic nations dreaded lest they 
should be unable to defend themselves. This gave Cn. Manlius an 
opportunity of undertaking a campaign against them, and to come 
forward as the protector of the Asiatics against the Galatians. His 
demand that they should submit had been answered by those bar- 
barians with a stolida ferocia, and he accordingly marched through 
Phrygia, and attacked them in their mountains, without, however, 
extirpating them. They continued in those districts, and preserved 
their Celtic language for a remarkably long period. We find it 
even in the time of Augustus ; but they, too, became Hellenised, 

g2 



84 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

and in this condition we find them at the time of St. Paul. The 
campaign of Manlius Vulso against them was most desirable to the 
inhabitants of Asia Minor, but on the part of the Romans, it was 
very unjust, for Manlius Vulso undertook it contrary to the express 
will of the decern legati who followed him' to Asia. The war was 
brought to a close in two campaigns, but the Romans derived no 
advantages from it, except the booty, and perhaps a sum of money 
which was paid to them ; for the countries between Western Asia 
and the districts of the Galatians were not subject to the Romans, 
but only allied with them. The Galatians suffered so severe a de- 
feat, that from this time forward they continued to live in quiet 
obedience to the Romans." 

To the existence of Galli, Galatce, or Gallo-Grceci in Phrygia, I 
take no exceptions. The following passage in Livy contains the 
very name in question : — " Non plus ex viginti millibus hominum, 
quam decern armata erant. Tamen tantum terroris omnibus, quae cis 
Taurum incolunt, gentibus injecerunt, ut, quas adissent quasque non 
adissent, pariter ultimse propinquis, imperio parerent. Postremo, 
quum tres essent gentes, Tolistoboii, Trocmi, Tectosagi, in tres partes, 
qua cuique populorum suorum vectigalis Asia esset, diviserunt. 
Trocmis Hellesponti ora data ; Tolistoboii iEolida atque Ioniam ; 
Tectosagi mediterranea Asise sortiti sunt, et stipendium tota cis 
Taurum Asia exigebant. Sedem autem ipsi sibi circa Halyn flumen 
ceperunt; tantusque terror eorum nominis erat, multitudine etiam 
magna sobole aucta, ut Syrian quoque ad postremum reges stipendium 
dare non abnuerent. Primus Asiam incolentium abnuit Attalus, 
pater regis Eumenis." 

Further notice of this obscure question is taken in not. ad v. 
Treviri. 

- Helvetii.] — Much as is said about national migrations, as 
opposed to the mere movements of great armies, containing only the 
male portion of the population, there are but few, very few, for 
which we have the unexceptionable evidence of contemporary wit- 
nesses, and fewer still where we have an account of the details. 

Of the absolute evacuation of the original country there is no 
recorded instance — except in the case of habitually migratory tribes, 
to whom agriculture is unknown. 

Indeed, it is doubtful whether any movement of the kind in 
question, beyond that of a vast army with a proportionate number 



NOTES ON SECTION XXVIII. 85 

of camp-followers (thus involving the presence of a certain number 
of women and children) has ever been recorded. The nearest 
recorded approach to such, in modern times, is the return of the 
Kalmuk Mongols, from the parts between the Don and Volga, to their 
original home in Western Mongolia. Here, old and young, male 
and female, joined the migration, and the original locality was well- 
nigh emptied of its Mongolians. Yet this was under peculiar cir- 
cumstances. The population which thus set itself in movement was 
not seeking a new seat (novas sedes), but returning to the country 
from whence it originally came, and to which it naturally be- 
longed. The search after a fresh locality is part and parcel of our 
ideas of a migration. If the Jews from all parts of the world were 
to return and re-people Palestine, we might, perhaps, coin the term 
re-migration, but I do not think we should talk of the Jeivisk 
migration. If such be the case, the return of the Kalmuks is only 
an approach to a migration of the kind so often assumed. 
I give Cassar's account of the Helvetic migration in full. 

C^S. BELL. GALL. LIB. I. 

II. Apud Helvetios longe nobilissimus et ditissimus fuit Orge- 
torix. Is M. Messala et M. Pisone Coss. regni cupiditate inductus, 
conjurationem nobilitatis fecit et civitati persuasit, ut de finibus 
suis cum omnibus copiis exirent : perfacile esse, quum virtute omni- 
bus prsestarent, totius Gallise imperio potiri. Id hoc facilius eis 
persuasit, quod undique loci natura Helvetii continentur : una ex 
parte fiumine Ptheno, latissimo atque altissimo, qui agrum Helvetium 
a Germanis dividit ; altera ex parte monte Jura altissimo, qui est 
inter Sequanos et Helvetios ; tertia lacu Lemanno et fiumine 
Rhodano, qui provinciam nostram ab Helvetiis dividit. His rebus 
fiebat, ut et minus late vagarentur, et minus facile fmitimis bellum 
inferre possent : qua de caussa homines bellandi cupidi magno dolore 
adficiebantur. Pro multitudine autem hominum, et pro gloria belli 
atque fortitudinis, angustos se fines habere arbitrabantur, qui in lon- 
gitudinem millia passuum ccxl., in latitudinem clxxx. patebant. 

III. His rebus adducti, et auctoritate Orgetorigis permoti, con- 
stituerunt, ea, qua? ad profiscendum pertinerent, comparare ; jumeyU- 
torum et carrorum quam maximum numerum coemere ; sementes 
quam maximas facere, ut in itinere copia frumenti suppeteret ; cum 
proximis civitatibus pacem et amicitiam confirmare. Ad eas res 
conficiendas biennium sibi satis esse duxerunt : in tertium annum 



86 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

profectionem lege confirmant. Ad eas res conficiendas Orgetorix 
deligitur. Is, ubi legationem ad civitates suscepit, in eo itinere 
persuadet Castico, Cataniantaledis filio, Sequano, cujus pater regnum 
in Sequanis multos annos obtinuerat, et a senatu populi Romani 
amicus adpellatus erat, ut regnum in civitate sua occuparet, quod 
pater ante habuerat : itemque Dumnorigi iEduo, fratri Divitiaci, 
qui eo tempore principatum in civitate obtinebat ac maxime plebi 
acceptus erat, ut idem conaretur, persuadet, eique filiam suam in 
matrimonium dat. Perfacile factu esse, illis probat, conata perficere, 
propterea quod ipse suae civitatis imperium obtenturus esset : non 
esse dubium, quin totius Gallia? plurimum Helvetii possent : se suis 
copiis suoque exercitu illis regna conciliaturum, confirmat. Hac 
oratione adducti, inter se fidem et jusjurandum dant et, regno occu- 
pato, per tres potentissimos ac firmissimos populos totius Gallise sese 
potiri posse sperant. 

IV. Ea res ut est Helvetiis per indicium enunciata, moribus suis 
Orgetorigem ex vinculis caussam dicere coegernnt : damnatum 
poenam sequi oportebat, ut igni cremaretur. Die constituta caussae 
dictionis, Orgetorix ad judicium omnem suam familiam, ad hominum 
millia decern, undique coegit et omnes clientes obseratosque suos, 
quorum magnum numerum habebat, eodem conduxit : per eos, ne 
caussam diceret, se eripuit. Quum civitas, ob earn rem incitata 
armis jus suum exsequi conaretur multitudinemque hominum ex 
agris magistratus cogerent, Orgetorix mortuus est : neque abest 
suspicio, ut Helvetii arbitrantur, quin ipse sibi mortem consciverit. 

V. Post ejus mortem nihilo minus Helvetii id, quod consti- 
tuerant, facere conantur, ut e finibus suis exeant. Ubi jam se 
ad earn rem paratos esse arbitrati sunt, oppida sua omnia, 
numero ad duodecim, vicos ad quadringentos, reliqua privata 
Mdificia incendunt, frumentum omne, praeter quod secum portaturi 
erant, comburunt, ut, domum reditionis spe sublata, paratiores ad 
omnia pericula subeunda essent : trium mensium molita cibaria sibi 
quemque domo efferre jubent. Persuadent Rauracis et Tulingis et 
Latobrigis finitimis, uti, eodem usi consilio, oppidis suis vicisque 
exustis, una cum iis proficiscantur : Boiosque, qui trans Rhenum 
incoluerant et in agrum Noricum transierant Noreiamque oppu- 
gnarant, receptos ad se socios sibi adsciscunt. 

VI. Erant omnino itinera duo, quibus itineribus domo exire 
possent : unum per Sequanos, angustum et difficile, inter montem 
Juram et flumen Rbodanum, vix qua singuli carri ducerentur ; mons 



NOTES ON SECTION XXVIII. 87 

autem altissimus impendebat, ut facile perpauci prohibere pos- 
sent : alteram per provinciam nostram, raulto facilius atque 
expeditius, propterea quod Helvetic-rum inter fines et Allobrogum, 
qui nuper pacati erant, Rhodanus fluit, isque nonnullis locis vado 
transitur. Extremum oppidum Allobrogum est proximumque Hel- 
vetiorum finibus, Geneva. Ex eo oppido pons ad Helvetios pertinet. 
Allobrogibus sese vel persuasuros, quod nondum bono animo in 
populum Romanum viderentur, existimabant ; vel vi coacturos, ut 
per suos fines eos ire paterentur. Omnibus rebus ad profectionem 
comparatis, diem dicunt, qua die ad ripam Rhodani omnes con- 
veniant : is dies erat a. d. V. Kal. Apr. L. Pisone, A. Gabinio Coss. 

VII. Caesari quum id nunciatum es"set, eos per provinciam 
nostram iter facere conari, maturat ab urbe proficisci ; et, quam 
maximis potest itineribus, in Galliam ulteriorem contendit et ad 
Genevam pervenit ; provincise toti quam maximum potest militum 
numerum imperat (erat omnino in Gallia ulteriore legio una) : pon- 
tem, qui erat ad Genevam, jubet rescindi. Ubi de ejus adventu 
Helvetii certiores facti sunt, legatos ad eum mittunt, nobilissimos 
civitatis, cujus legationis Nameius et Verudoctius principem locum 
obtinebant, qui dicerent " sibi esse in animo, sine ullo maleficio itei 
per provinciam facere, propterea quod aliud iter haberent nullum : 
rogare, ut ejus voluntate id sibi facere liceat." Caesar, quod memoria 
tenebat, L. Cassium consulem occisum, exercitumque ejus ab Hel- 
vetiis pulsum et sub jugum missum, concedendum non putabat : 
neque homines inimico animo, data facultate per provinciam itineris 
faciundi, temperaturos ab injuria et maleficio existimabat. Tamen, 
ut spatium intercedere posset, dum milites, quos imperaverat, con- 
venient, legatis respondit, " diem se ad deliberandum sumturum ; si 
quid vellent, a. d. Idus Apr. reverterentur." 

VIII. Interea ea legione, quam secum habebat, militibusque, 
qui ex provincia convenerant, a lacu Lemanno, qui in flumen Rho- 
danum influit, ad montem Juram, qui fines Sequanorum ab Helvetiis 
dividit, millia passuum decern novem murum, in altitudinem pedum 
sedecim, fossamque perducit. Eo opere perfecto, praesidia disponit 
castella communit, quo facilius, si se invito transire conarentur, pro- 
hibere possit. Ubi ea dies, quam constituerat cum legatis, venit, et 
legati ad eum reverterunt, negat, " se more et exemplo populi Romani 
posse iter ulli per provinciam dare ; et, si vim facere conentur, prohi- 
biturum " ostendit. Helvetii, ea spe dejecti, navibus junctis ratibusque 
compluribus factis, alii vadis Rhodani, qua minima altitudo fluminis 



88 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

erat, nonnunquam interdiu, saepius noctu, si perrumpere possent, 
conati, operis munitione et railitum concursu et telis repulsi, hoc 
conatu destiterunt. 

IX. Relinquebatur una per Sequanos via, qua, Sequanis invitis, 
propter angustias ire non poterant. His quuru sua sponte persuadere 
non possent, legatos ad Dumnorigem JEduuni inittunt, ut eo depre- 
catore a Sequanis impetrarent. Dumnorix gratia et largitione apud 
Sequanos plurimum poterat et Helvetiis erat amicus, quod ex ea 
civitate Orgetorigis filiam in matrimonium duxerat, et cupiditate 
regni adductus novis rebus studebat et quam plurimas civitates suo 
sibi beneficio habere obstrictas volebat. Itaque rem suscipit et a 
Sequanis impetrat, ut per fines suos ire Helvetios patiantur, obsides- 
que uti inter sese dent, perficit : Sequani, ne itinere Helvetios prohi- 
beant ; Helvetii, ut sine maleficio et injuria transeant. 

X. Ccesari renuntiatur, Helvetiis esse in animo, per agrum 
Sequanorum et iEduoruin iter in Santonum fines facere, qui non 
longe a Tolosatium finibus absunt, quae civitas est in provincia. Id 
si fieret, intelligebat, magno cum periculo provinciae futurum, ut 
homines bellicosos, populi Romani inimicos, locis patentibus maxi- 
meque frumentariis finitimos haberet. Ob eas caussas ei munitioni, 
quam fecerat, T. Labienum legatum pr.efecit : ipse in Italiam magnis 
itineribus contendit, duasque ibi legiones conscribit et tres, quae 
circum Aquileiam hiemabant, ex hibernis educit et, qua proximum 
iter in ulteriorem Galliam per Alpes erat, cum his quinque legio- 
nibus ire contendit. Ibi Centrones et Graioceli et Caturiges, locis 
superioribus occupatis, itinere exercitum prohibere conantur. Com- 
pluribus his prceliis pulsis, ab Ocelo, quod est citerioris provinciae 
extremum, in fines Vocontiorum ulterioris provincial die septimo 
pervenit : inde in Allobrogum fines, ab Allobrogibus in Segusianos 
exercitum ducit. Hi sunt extra provinciam trans Rhodanum primi. 

XI. Helvetii jam per angustias et fines Sequanorum suas copias 
transduxerant et in iEduorum fines pervenerant eorumque agros 
populabantur. iEdui, quum se suaque ab iis defendere non possent, 
legatos ad Caesarem mittunt rogatum auxilium : " ita se omni tempore 
de populo Romano meritos esse, ut paene in conspectu exercitus nostri 
agri vastari, liberi eorum in servitutem abduci, oppida expugnari non 
debuerint." Eodem tempore Ambarri, necessarii et consanguinei 
iEduorum, Caesarem certiorem faciunt, sese, depopulatis agris, non 
facile ab oppidis vim hostium prohibere : item Allobroges, qui trans 
Rhodanum vicos possessionesque habebant, fuga se ad Caesarem 



NOTES ON SECTION XXVIII. 89 

recipiunt et deruonstrant, sibi prater agri solum nihil esse reliqui. 
Quibus rebus adductus Caesar, non exspectanduin sibi statuit, dum, 
omnibus fortunis sociorum consumtis, in Santonos Helvetii per- 
venirent. 

XII. Flumen est Arar, quod per fines iEduorum et Sequanorum 
in Rhodanum influit incredibili lenitate, ita ut oculis, in utram 
partem fluat, judicari non possit. Id Helvetii ratibus ac lintribus 
junctis transibant. Ubi per exploratores Csesar certior factus est, tres 
jam copiarum partes Helvetios id flumen transduxisse, quartam 
vero partem citra flumen Ararim reliquam esse : de tertia vigilia 
cum legionibus tribus e castris profectus, ad earn partem pervenit, 
quse nondum flumen transierat. Eos * impeditos et inopinantes 
adgressus, magnam eorum partem concidit : reliqui fugas sese man- 
darunt atque in proximas silvas abdiderunt. Is pagus adpellabatur 
Tigurinus : nam omnis civitas Helvetia in quatuor pagos divisa est. 
Hie pagus unus, quum domo exisset, patrum nostrorum memoria 
L. Cassium consulem interfecerat et ejus exercitum sub jugum 
miserat. Ita, sive casu, sive consilio deorum immortalium, quse 
pars civitatis Helvetise insignem calamitatem populo Romano intu- 
lerat, ea princeps pcenas persolvit. 



XXVII. Helvetii, omnium rerum inopia adducti, legatos de 
deditione ad eum miserunt. Qui quum eum in itinere convenissent 
seque ad pedes projecissent suppliciterque locuti flentes pacem 
petissent, atque eos in eo loco, quo turn essent, suum adventum 
exspectare jussisset, paruerunt. Eo postquam Csesar pervenit, obsides, 
arma, servos, qui ad eos perfugissent, poposcit. Dum ea conqui- 
runtur et conferuntur, nocte intermissa, circiter bominum millia 
vi. ejus pagi, qui Verbigenus adpellatur, sive timore perterriti, ne 
armis traditis supplicio adficerentur, sive spe salutis inducti, quod, 
in tanta multitudine dedititiorum, suam fugam aut occultari, aut 
omnino ignorari posse existimarent, prima nocte e castris Helve- 
tiorum egressi, ad Rhenum. finesque Germanorum contenderunt. 

XXVIII. Quod ubi Csesar resciit, quorum per fines ierant, bis, 
uti conquirerent et reducerent, si sibi purgati esse vellent, imperavit : 
reductos in hostium nuniero babuit : reliquos omnes, obsidibus, 
armis, perfugis traditis, in deditionem accepit. Helvetios, Tulingos, 
Latobrigos in fines suos, unde erant profecti, reverti jussit ; et quod, 
omnibus fructibus amissis, dorai nihil erat, quo famem tolerarent, 



90 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

Allobrogibus imperavit, ut iis frumeriti copiam facerent : ipsos 
oppida vicosque, quos incenderant, restituere jussit. Id ea maxiine 
ratione fecit, quod noluit, eum locum, uncle Helvetii discesserant, 
vacare ; ne propter bonitatem agrorum Gerniani, qui trans Rbenum 
incolunt, e suis finibus in Helvetiorum fines transirent, et finitimi 
Galliae provinciae Allobrogibusque essent. Boios, petentibus iEduis, 
quod egregia virtute erant cogniti, ut in finibus suis collocarent, 
concessit : quibus illi agros dederunt, quosque postea in parem juris 
libertatisque conditionem, atque ipsi erant, receperunt. 

XXIX. In castris Helvetiorum tabulae repertoe sunt, litteris 
Grcecis confectce, et ad Caesarem relate, quibus in tabulis nominatim 
ratio confecta erat, qui numerus domo exisset eorum, qui arma ferre 
possent : et item separatim pueri, senes, mulieresque. Quarum 
omnium rerum summa erat, capitum Helvetiorum millia cclxiii., 
Tulingorum millia xxxvi., Latobrigorum xiv., Rauracorum xxiii., 
Boiorum xxxn. : ex his, qui arma ferre possent, ad millia xcn. 
Summa omnium fuerunt ad millia ccclxviii. Eorum, qui domum 
redierunt, censu babito, ut Crcsar imperaverat, repertus est numerus 
millium c. et x. 

The Deserta Helvetiorum I believe to have been, not the waste 
tract left by any emigrant Helvetii, but the waste tract left as a 
March on the Helveto-Germanic frontier ; a waste, most probably, 
of German rather than Gallic making. 

3 Boienii nomen, &c] — Zeuss considers that the present pas- 
sage in Tacitus is the complement to the statement of Caesar ; and 
that the former fills up the holes left by the latter, " Erst Tacitus, 
die Liicken, die Ca?sar gelassen hat, ausfullend berichtet dariiber, 
validiores, &c." (p. 171.) 

I do not think this. Tacitus merely assents to the reasonableness 
of Caesar's opinion as to the Gauls having once encroached upon 
the Germans, instead of (as in his time) retiring before them, and 
confirms it with the fresh instance involved in the name Boiohem. 
He also justifies us in carrying the Gauls of Germany as far north 
as the Maine. 

But the important word is the compound Boi-o-hem-um. 

It was a name well known to the Romans ; and this allows 
Tacitus to bestow little more than a passing allusion to it. 

The writers who first use it are Paterculus and Strabo. See 
Prolegomena. 



NOTES ON SECTION XXVIII. 91 

It is truly and unequivocally German — a German gloss. The 
-hem = occupation, residence, being the same word as the -heim 
in Mann-heim in High German ; the -hem in Arn-hem in Dutch ; 
the -um in Dokk-wm in Frisian ; the -ham in Threhing-ham 
in English. Hence Boi-o-hem-um=the home of the Boii. As a 
gloss, its unequivocal character is on the same high level with the 
compound Marc-o-manni. No one, however much opposed to ety- 
mological guess-work, has ever objected to either. 

Word for word, and element for element, Boiohemum is the same 
as Bohemia. 

Some of the other compounds of the root Boi- are interesting. 

Be-heim-are, a triple compound, or a decomposite, combines the 
elements of both Ba-varia and Bo-hem-ia, and stands for Be-heim- 
ware=the occupants of the home of the Boii. 

Boe-manni=the Boian men. 

Beo-tvinidi=the Boian Wends, or Slavonians. 

With the exception of the compound Marc-o-manni, no German 
gloss was more current in Rome than the word in question. Strabo 
has it, 'Eoti ml to Bovtaijdov to tov Mapo€ovSov fSaoiXeiov, slg ov 
IkzIvoq tottov aWovg ts ixtTaviaTriae irXtiov^, Kal Srj tovq bixotdvelg 
kavTtp MapicofifxdrovQ- — Strabo, vii. 1. 

Ptolemy's form is BaLvoyaijiai; a form taken from some dialect 
where the h was pronounced as a stronger guttural than elsewhere. 

Word for word, and element for element, Boiohemum= Bohemia ; 
but whether the localities coincide as closely as the forms of the name, 
is another question. It has been too readily assumed that they do. 

It cannot be denied that identity of name is prima facie evidence 
of identity of place. But it is not more. Hence, although it would 
be likely enough, if the question were wholly uncomplicated, that 
the Boiohemum of Paterculus were the Bohemia of the present century, 
doubts arise as soon as the name and the description disagree, and 
they increase when the identification of either the Boii, or their 
German invaders, with the inhabitants of Bohemia leads to ethno- 
logical and geographical difficulties. 

All this is really the case. 

The disagreement between the name Boio-hem and the position 
of the present country of Bohemia meets us in the very passage 
before us. The former lies between the Maine, the Rhine, and the 
Hercynian Forest. No part of Bohemia is thus bounded. 

As to the history of the Boii, it is one of great prominence and 



92 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

importance. But what is that of the geographical area now called 
Bohemia 1 So unknown was that remarkable country to the Greeks 
and Romans, that its obscurity was that of the central parts of Africa 
in our own time. There was a reason for this. Its natural moun- 
tain-rampart would preserve it from invasion. 

Those same mountain-ramparts, however, which would thus tend 
to keep the country inviolate, in the case of a war, could hardly 
escape notice and description. Yet no such notices and descrip- 
tions exist. Of the present Bohemia, we find no unequivocal ac- 
count whatever in any Roman writer. Equivocal accounts we do 
find : but these are got at by assuming the Marcomannic kingdom 
of Maroboduus to have lain within Bohemia, and as they apply to 
this Marcomannic kingdom only, they cease to be Bohemian as soon 
as the Marcomanni are placed elsewhere. 

It may simplify the question to anticipate. 

I believe the Boi-o-hem-um of Tacitus to have been, not Bohemia, 
but Bavaria. 

Bavaria and Bohemia are nearly the same words. 

a. The first element in each is the proper name Boii. In the 
sixth and seventh centuries the fuller form of Bavaria is Bojo-aria, 
Bai-varia, Bajo-aria, Baiu-varii, &c. 

b. The second element is equivalent in power, though not inform, 
to the second element in Bo-hemia. It is the word ware=inhabitants 
or ocaqxints in the Anglo-Saxon form, Cantware=p>eople of Kent. 

Hence Bohemia = the Boian occupancy ; Bavaria — the occupant 
Boians. 

This leads us to the fact that however much we may place the 
Boii in Bo-hemia, we cannot do so exclusively. As far as the name 
goes, there were Boii in Bavaria as well ; Boii, too, who gave their 
name to their land. 

But this is not enough. We require substantive proof beyond 
the inference arising from the similarity of name for this latter fact. 
At present the argument stands thus : — 

Boiohem, in the time of Tacitus, meant Bavaria. Not so, may be 
the answer. It is granted that only one locality may be intended 
by the two names, but why may not Bavaria originally have meant 
Bohemia ? The answer to this must rest on its own grounds. 

It is no small argument in favour of the original single power 
of the two names, to find that the alternative just indicated is a 
real one. Zeuss expends much learning upon it, giving reasons 



NOTES ON SECTION XXVIII. 93 

for believing not that the Boii of Bavaria were one people, whilst 
the Boii of Bohemia were another, nor yet that that name Bohemia 
originally meant Bavaria, but that Bavarian Bohemia. 

I reverse Zeuss's view, believing that Boihemis= Bavaria. The 
Boia-hemum of Tacitus (as already stated) is certainly more Bavarian 
than Bohemian. 

So is that of Strabo ; every association of the Boii of the fol- 
lowing passage is with the populations so far south, as to make 
Bavaria a more likely locality for them than Bohemia. 

BoipE^iarrjQ . . Botovg Kal dpdrjv ijcpdvure tovq vnb Kpiraaipa, 
Kal Tavpirricovc. — Str. vii. p. 304. Td 'IkXvpmd.. . dpldpiEva aVo rrjg 
Xi/j.vr]g tT]q Kard tovq QvivceXtKovg Kal 'FaiTOvg Kal Totviovg. M.epog 
fxev ci{] ti Trjg yjopag ravrrjg rjpinuwaav ol AaVoi KaraKo\tfxi]aavrEg 
Boiovc Kal TavpicrKovg, 'iQvr) KeXriicd, rd virb JLpiTotripa). — Id. p. 313. 

Again — 

Me'yiora i\v t&v KeXt&v edvr) Botoi, Kal "Ivaovtpoi, Kal ol rr/v 
'PwjKatwv ttoXlv ki, i(j>6cov KaTaXatovTEg Y,evit)V£g perd T'ctMraruiv 
rovrovg fiev ovv E^,i(pO£ipav varspov reXiijjg Pw/.ia7oi. Tovg £e Bo'iove 
kl,i]Xarrav ek tuiv tottojv' /UETaaTavTEg <T tig rovg irepl tov "larpov 
TOTtovg, fxtra TavpiGKiov wkovv' TroXefiovvreg irpbg AaKag, ewg ciwil)- 
Xovto iravsdiEi' ttjv tie yupav ovaav ri)g 'IXXvpiEog jj.t]X6€otov Tolg 
-rrepioiKovai KareXiTTOi'. — V. p. 242,243. 'JUvTog rov Hdcov . . kute'l^ov 
%e Botoi Kctt ALyvEg, Kal *1evu)veq, Kal Vatadrai to ttXeoV twv Se 
"Bo'iiov iE,£\ad{vTU)v, dcpaviadEVTWv £e" Kal tu>v YaiGaT&v, Kal ^.evojvojv, 
XEiTrerai Ta AtyvartKa (pvXa, Kal twv 'Pwjuatwvat dnoiKiai. — p. 216. 

Again — 

KaTE^ovcrt £e Tijv Eirap-^iav (Jlavvoviav Tr)v dvw), ev fxkv toIq 
Trpog apKTOvg fispEaiv," AfaAoi /jlev hvfffjuKtoTEpoi. Kvtvol <T dvaro- 

XlKCJTEpOl' EV (*£ TOIQ HE(TrjfJl€piVO~ig, AaTotlKOt /UEV, VTTO TO NbJpiKOV. 

OvapKiavol Se rd irpbg dvaToXdg' ev Se To'tg yueraijv, Bowl [xzv irpbg 
Sva/ddg, Kal vir avrovg, KoXeriavoi. 'Idvaiot. de Trpog dvaToXdg, Kal 
vtt aWovg, 'Oo-epiaVfc. — Ptolem. Geog. ii. 14. 

Ko:te\ov(7i ()e Kal avrrjv tyjv iwap-^iav (Jlavvoviav t\)v ra'rw), ev 

/-LEV TOlg C!VtTfXlKO~Lg jdEpECTlV, 'A^iaVTtVol dpKTIKWTEpOL' Vf^ OVg 'EfJTOV- 

viaTEQ, Eira 'AvduivrEg, ara BpEiiKor ev Se To'tg dvaToXiKolg, dpKTiKil)- 
tutoi jjev, 'ApatHaKoi' /nEur]p.€pivu)TEpoi (Ie iKopdiGKOL. — lb. ii. 15. 

In the reference to Posidonius we have an older authority than 
that of either Strabo himself, or Caesar. 

<&t](rl Se Kal (6 Tloaacwviog) Bc'touc tov 'l&pKvviov Epvfiov olkeIv 
irpoTEpov' rovg ()£ Kifx€povg bpfxijaavTag ettI tov tottov tovtov, 



94 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

diroKpova-davrctQ Itto twv Boiiov etti Tuv"l<TTpoy . . . Kara^rjvai. — Str. 
vii. 1. 

Ccesar's evidence goes the same way. His Bohemia joined Nori- 
cuni, 'which our Bohemia does not — " Boiosque, qui trans Rhenum 
iucoluerant, et in agrum Noricura transierant, Noreiamque oppu- 
gnarant, receptos ad se socios sibi adsciscunt." — Bell. Gall. i. 5. 

So does that of the following inscription : — l. volcatio q. f. vel. 

PRIMO. PR.EF. COH. I. NORICOR. IN PANN. PRiEF. KIVM DANVVI. ET 
CIVITATUM DUARUM BOIORUM ET AZALIORUM. Gruter, 490, 2. 

We may now trace the name Bavaria. In the geographer of 
Ravenna is the following corrupt passage : — " Est patria quae di- 
citur Albis ungani (?) montuosa per longum, quae ad orientem 
multuni extenditur, cujus aliqua pars Baias dicitur." 

It is in the same geographer that the name Baio-varii first occurs. 

Zeuss's reasoning is that Baias = Bohemia ; that the Baio-varii 
came from thence, and that changing their places they changed the 
form of their name also. " The Baiovarii, Paigira, Baiern are from 
the country Baia. This population changed its locality with its 
name."=Die Baiovarii, Paigira, Baiern sind die aus dem lande Baia. 
Mit seinem namen andert das Volk auch seine Sitze." — pp. 367, 
368. 

No one need admit more freely than Zeuss, that all evidence of 
this migration of the Baians from Bohemia is wanting; as well 
as that there is no evidence of Bohemia having ever been called 
Bavaria. 

I collect, too, from his numerous and valuable quotations, that — 

1. The evidence of the present country of Bavaria being called 
by a compound of Boio + ware, begins as early as the sixth century. 

2. That the evidence of the present country of Bohemia being 
called by a compound of Boio -\-heim is no earlier than the eleventh. 

I also collect from the same data, that, though the Bavarians of 
Bavaria are called Boii as late as the eleventh century, there is no 
instance of the Bohemians being so called — save and except in the 
equivocal case of the Baia of the geographer of Ravenna. 

This reduces the evidence of the old Boio-h.emu.rn. being Bo-hemia 
to two facts — 

1. The name Baia; supposed to mean Bohemia, from the fact of 
its being on the water-system of the Elbe. But Albis here may 
mean the Saale, See not. in v. Hermunduri. 

2. The present name Bo-hemia. 



NOTES ON SECTION XXVIII. 95 

But, this is — 

a. Recent in origin. 

b. German rather than Tshekh, or true Bohemian, and not origi- 
nally even German, hut Gallic. 

c. Mutilated in form — since, though we in England say Bohemia 
from Boio-heim, the German name is Boh-m-en=Bo-hem-ians. 

The arguments founded on this are, surely, by themselves, weak. 
Granted. But we must take them along with the facts involved in 
the Bohemian empire of Maroboduus, and Bohemian Marcomanni. 
Yes. But all this is also exceptionable. 

The only ww-exceptionable series of facts is that which connects 
the home of the Boii with Bavaria=the Boian occupants. 

This justifies us in thinking Bohemia is a modern name, even as 
Belgium is ; from which it differs in degree only ; i.e. in being- 
eight hundred years earlier. 

That it as little grew directly and continuously out of the Boii as 
Belgium did from the Bclgce, is nearly certain. 

The Deserta Boiorum I believe to have been, not the waste tract 
left by any emigrant Boii, but the waste tract left as a March on 
the Boio-Germanic frontier; a waste, most probably, of German 
rather than Gallic making. 

4 Aravisci.] — Their locality was the most north-eastern part of Pan- 
nonia. The termination -sci is common in these parts for some dis- 
tance southwards, e.g., in the names Scord-isci, Taur-i'sa, &c. 

5 Osis, Germanorumnatione.~\ — If we took these words by themselves 
we should say, at once, that the Osi were Germans in respect to their 
ethnological position. That they are not so, is shown by § 43. 
See also not. in v. Osi. Yet Tacitus calls them Germanorum natio, 
on the strength of their geographical position only. This should 
caution us against considering his term Germania to be more ethno- 
logical than it really is. In the case of the Osi, we have a qualifying 
statement; and it was required — since, without it, we should have 
considered both them and the Aravisci Germans. But, as it is far 
from certain that such qualifying statements are given in all cases, 
without exception, we must remember the possibility of certain 
non-Germanic populations being called Germani, just as the Osi are 
here ; whilst the data for correcting the natural inference from such 
a passage, are non-existent. 



96 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

6 Aravisci — ab Osis, Osi ab Araviscis^\ — This involves the question 
of the relationship between' the two. 

By admitting the omission of an initial guttural (ch or kh), a 
change justified by the form u4ttuarii as opposed to CViattuarii, and 
by considering the -isc to represent a Slavonic compound sibilant 
(itsh or ishts/t) we get at some such form as Kharavatsh ; a form 
which may fairly be supposed to be no unlikely name for that im- 
portant branch of the Slavonic nation which appears in Herodotus as 
Krobyz-i, at the present time, as Croatians. 

As early as the tenth century the name appears in the more un- 
exceptionable form Khorvat-i (Nestor), in Greek XpwSa-oi (Constant. 
Forphyrog.) Xopgdroi (Cedrenus). 

That the undoubted Croatian area was discontinuous, or, at least, 
that the population fell, like that of the Osi and Aravisci, into two 
divisions, is inferred from two expressions. One of these is altera, 
e.g., in Cosmas of Prague (a.d. 108G) in the following notice : "Ad 
aquilonalem hi sunt termini : Psouane, Ghrouati, et altera Chrouatia, 
Zlasane, Trebouane, Bobarane." The other epithet is more impor- 
tant. Nestor calls his Croatians Khorvali bjelii=white Croatians. 
The Turks translated this epithet by aspar. 

"On ol Xpw£aroi ol eIq to. AtXfxariag vvv KaTOiKovvTEQ /ueprj, aVo 
twv d^airTia-wv XpwtaTwv Kal twv * hoirpwv £Trovop.a£opEvwv tcard- 
yot'rai' o'Ltiveq TovpKta; p.tv etceidev, <f>payylaQ oe irXrjaiov kcltoikovm, 
ko.1 (Tvvopovcri S/cXaGotc toic dSan-laroig %ip€\oig' to Be Xpio€drot tt\ 
twv 2t:Xa'bW cioXektw EpprjVEVETai, tovteoti, ol tijv iroXXrjv ywpav 
KaTEypv-EQ. — Const. Porphyrog. De Admin. Imp. c. 31, ed. Par. p. 97. 
Ot c?£ XpwtaTOi KaTu)Kovv TT]vucavTa ekeIBev Bayi^apa'ac, ivda tlalv 
dpTiiog BeXo^pw^aVoi, pla £e yEVEa CLa^wpiaQt~i(Ta ei; uvtwv, tfyovv 

aC£\(pol TTEVTE, 0, TE KXoVKdg KO.1 6 A6€eXoq KCU 6 KoUEVT^rjQ Kal 6 

Mou)(Xw* Kal 6 Xpu>£aroc, Kal a£e X<pal Ivo, i] Tovya Kal ?/ Bovya, fieTa 
tov Xaov aWwv i)X6ov eiq AtXpaTiav. . . ol oe Xourol Xpco£a'roi 'ipEivav 
Tvpbq Qpayyiav Kal Xe'yovrai apTiwc, "QtXo^pwtaTOi, i\yovv " Aaizpoi 
XpwEarot, tyovTEQ tov 'iciov dpy^ovTa' VTroKEivrai Ee"Qitw tu> MeyaXw 
pjjyt <&payyiag ttjq Kal "LafyaQ, Kal dtdirTUJTOi Tvyydvovai, avpiTEv- 
dEpiag p£Ta tovc TovpKovg Kal dydnac e-^ovteq. — C. 30, ed. Par. p. 
95. "Oti i] ptydXt] XpwtaTta Kal f]"A<nrpri iirovopa^opEvr) d€diTTiaTOc 
TvyydvEi p£XP L rov oilp-tpov, KadwQ Kal ol 7rXr](Tid£ovr£Q avTr\v 
%ip€XoC oXiyoTEpov Ka€aXXapiKov EKtdXXovo-iv opoiwg (cat tte^lkov 

* Probably, the eponymi of the Lygii and Mugilones. 



NOTES ON SECTION XXVIII. 97 

irapd ri)v fiaiTTiGnivriv Xpw€aTiav, ojq ovvEyiaTEpov Trpai^EvopEvm 
irapd te twv $>pdy*'wv, Kal TovpKwv* Kal liar £ ivaK it w v. 'AAA' o'vte 
(rayrjvag KEKTrjVTai, ovte KovSovpag, ovte ep.7ropevTiicd TrXola, wq fjiijicodev 
ovariQ Ttjg SaAdtrarjg' utto yap ru>v ekeive p.E\pi t?}q SfaXdaurjQ 6S6g 
iany fj/xepuiy X'' i) £e SdXaaaa, £ig fjv did rwv tjpcpwv X' KcnipyovTai, 
iarlv i) Xsyofxet'y ^koteivt]. — C. 31, ed. Paris, p. 99 ; 13, p, 63. Of Si 
Xpiogdroi irpbq rd oprj toTq TovpKoiQ irapaKEivTai. 'Igteov oti ol 
1,eptXoi ditb twv dtairriGTiov 1,£p%Xwv, twc teal "Aenrpwv iTrovopafa- 
/uivwv, tcaTayovTai-, twv tyjq 'Yovpniac, itceiQtv KaroiKovvTwv slg tov irap 
avrolg Boiki T07TOV ETrovop.aZ6p.Evov, iv olc TvXr)(Jid^EL Kal >; <&payyia, 
o/zotwc Kal I] pEydXr) Xpw^aria i] d^drrTirTTOQ, f) Kal"A<rirpr] irpoGoyopEv 

Op.£Vri' £K£l(T£ OVV Kal OVTOl Ol ^,£p€Xoi TO GtV Ctp^jjC KaTWKOVV. — 

0. xxxii. p. 99. 

Now what if this division of the Croatians be as old as the time of 
Tacitus? and what if the Germans translated the name in early times, 
even as the Turks did afterwards? In this case the name Osi repre- 
sents the German Weiss= White, and the Osi are the White Croatians 
under their German name, and TFi's-berg (Oviagoupyioi of Ptolemy) 
is White-hill (or town), and even the mysterious Ask-iburgius Mons 
is Weiss-berg, 

No objections against this lie in the current notion that the Sla- 
vonians of the Danube did not make their appearance in history till 
the sixth century — the notion itself being not only objectionable, 
but almost certainly incorrect. All that we fairly get from the evi- 
dence of Procopius and others is, that it was the sixth century when 
the populations of the Lower Danube became known as Slavonians ; 
just as it was the third when the Westphalian and Hanoverian 
Germans became known as Saxons, or those of the Lower Rhine as 
Franks, and just as three populations out of four throughout the 
world are known at different periods of their history by different 
names. The reasonable suggestion of Zeuss that the Aravisci 
are the population of the Raab, is a real complication. So is 
the name of the river Cusus in the probable territory of the 
Osi. 

The complement to this note is not. in v. Osi in the sequel. 

That 0s= Weis is, perhaps, by itself, unlikely. 

That Aravisc =Hharavitsh is also, perhaps, by itself, unlikely. 

But that a part of the Aravisci called Osi, should = Weisse Hhara- 
vische is not unlikely — the evidence being of the sort called cumula- 
tive, where two small probabilities make one great one. 

H 



98 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

? Treviri.] — The lower third of the Moselle may he taken as the 
area of the Treviri ; extending (there or thereabouts) from Treves 
(Augusta Trevirorum) to Coblentz (Covfitientes). 

The chief nations with which they were conterminous on the 
side of Gaul were the Condrusi, Eburones, and Reini — all Belgce. 

The Treviri, like the Tencteri, were pre-eminently strong in 
cavalry. — Caesar, Bell. Gall. ii. 24, v. 3. 

They were also but slowly conquered. — " Treviri liberi antea," &c. 
— Plin. iv. 17. 

The name Treviri is most probably Gallic. The Tre-, is the Tre 
in such words as Tre-casses in ancient Gaul, and Tregonell in Corn- 
wall ; the Keltic tre=place, a root exceedingly common in Keltic 
geographical terms. The constitution was Gallic, the Condrusi and 
Eburones being clientes of the Treviri. 

The language of the Tre-viri is important. 

In most cases it would be hypercritical to suppose that there 
was any difference between the language of the town of Treves and 
the language of the Treviri. In the present question, however, it is 
not so. The area under consideration is the area of either a mixed 
population, or the area of mixed ethnological characteristics — at 
least, such is the language of both Ccesar and Tacitus. Hence, the 
dialect of the country and the dialect of the town may differ. All, 
then, that can be said is, that a statement as to the language of the 
town of Treves probably applies to that of the Treviri, and vice versa 
— probably, but not certainly. 

Now St. Jerome has the following passage (Prolegomen. lib. ii. ad 
Epist. ad Galat.) — " Unum est quod inferimus et promissum in 
exordio reddimus, Galatas excepto sermone Grajco, quo omnis Oriens 
loquitur, propriam linguam eandem pene habere quam Treviri, nee 
referre si aliqua exinde corruperint ; quum et Afri Phcenicum lin- 
guam nonnulla ex parte mutaverint ; et ipsa Latinitas et regionibus 
quotidie mutetur et tempore." 

I think that this language was that of the Tolistoboii, Trocmi, and 
Teclosagas, i.e., of those Galatoz who gave their name to Galatia. 

Mebuhr, however, denies that it was Galatian that St. Jerome 
heard ; and, after noticing the campaign of the Romans against 
them, he adds in a note that " St. Jerome says that he heard 
the same language in Phrygia as at Treves ; but this cannot be 
referred to the Galatians, and St. Jerome probably saw Germans who 
had settled in Phrygia at different times, especially Goths, in the 



NOTES ON SECTION XXVIII. 99 

reign of Theodosius. It may be looked upon as an established fact 
that Treves was German, and it is not likely that the Gallic language 
maintained itself in Asia down to so late a period." Why not? 
What are the very conclusive reason? which make Treves so Ger- 
man ? This is considered in the sequel.* 

8 Nervii.] — Belgians of the valley of the Sambre (Sabis) and the 
bravest Gauls of Gallia. Their opposition was the most obstinate Caesar 
met with ; and their extermination almost, but not wholly, complete. 

Strabo makes them conterminous with the Treviri; and, considered 
politically, they probably were so. The smaller populations, who 
stood in the relation of clients to either one or the other of these 
two great nations, probably filled up the whole tract from the sea, 
between Dunkirk and Ostend, to the Rhine about Coblentz. 

North-east of the Nervii lay the Aduatici ; a people not men- 
tioned by Tacitus, nor, indeed, by any writer but Caesar, who con- 
sidered them the descendants of the Teutones and Cimbri. 

Now Appian applies what Caesar says of the Aduatici to the 
Nervii, i)<rav Se (Ne'p^tot) rwv Kijj.€pu}v fcai Tevtovuv aTroyovoi. 

It is not difficult to conceive how such victories as that of Arrni- 
nius and other Germans being known to the Gauls, the name of 
German might become a matter of pride along the whole Belgic 
frontier, especially if there were an intermixture of German blood 
as well. This might take place even while the language, the consti- 
tution, and the religion remained Gallic. 

9 Vangiones.~\ — Their locality was the parts about Worms — Borbeto- 
magus, afterwards Wormatia ; to which Ammianus uses Civitas 

Vangionum as a synonym. 

The Vangiones are mentioned by Caesar as forming part of the 
army of Ariovistus. 

10 TribocL] — In the parts about Strasbourg.* 

The name seems Keltic ; Tre- being a Keltic prefix. 
The Tri-hoci are mentioned by Caesar as forming part of the 
army of Ariovistus. 

11 Hemetes.'] — Their locality was the parts about Spiers, originally 
Novio-magus. 

* See Epilegomenu, § The Quasi- Germanic Gauls. 

H 2 



100 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

The Nemetes are mentioned by Caesar as forming part of the army 
of Ariovistus. 

The words hand dabie applied to these three nations show that, 
in the mind of Tacitus, at least, they were not exactly in the same 
category. The evidence of their Germanic character was stronger 
in the one case than in the other. However clear the case might 
be with the Treviri and Nervii, it was clearer with the Vangiones, 
Nemetes, and Triboci. 

12 Ubii.] — In the time of Csesar, the Ubii were bounded by the 
Rhine, the country of the Suevi, and the country of the Sigambri. 
These two last lines of demarcation are indefinite. 

They belonged, however, then to the German side of the Rhine ; 
" Ubii, qui proximi accolunt, Rhenum attingunt." 

They were encroached on by their neighbours, and had conse- 
quently lost, rather than gained, power. 

They once constituted a civitas, " ci vitas ampla atque florens." — 
Csesar. 

Agrippa, in the reign of Augustus, transplanted them to form the 
Colonia Agrippinensis — Cologne, Hepdv le u>kovv Kara, tovtov tov 
totcov Ov€ioi, ovq /uer/)yay£i' V Aypt7r7rac Ikovtclq tig r^v ivTOQ tov 
'Pjyj'ou — Strabo, iv. p. 194. 

The complement to the last six notes is Epilegomena, § The Quasi- 
Germanic Gnu Is. 



XXIX. Omnium harum gentium virtute prsecipui 
Batavi, 1 non multum ex ripa, sed insulam Rheni amnis 
colunt, Chattorum quondam populus, et seditione do- 
mestica in eas sedes transgressus, in quibus pars Ro- 
mani imperii fierent. Manet honos, et antiquse so- 
cietatis insignernam nee tributis contemnuntur, nee 
•publicanus atterit : exempti oneribus et collationibus, 
et tantum in usum proeliorum sepositi, velut tela atque 
arma, bellis reservantur. Est in eodem obsequio et 
Mattiacorum 2 gens. Protulit enim magnitude* populi 
Romani ultra Rhenum, ultraque veteres terminos, 
imperii reverentiam. Ita sede finibusque in sua ripa, 



NOTES ON SECTION XXIX, 10] 

mente animoque nobiscum agunt, cetera similes Ba- 
tavis, nisi quod ipso adlmc terras suae solo et coelo 
acrius animantur. Non numeraverim inter Germanise 
populos, qnamquam trans Rhenum Danubiumque con- 
sederint, eos, qui Decumates agros 3 exercent. Le- 
vissimus quisque Gallorum, et inopia audax, dubise 
possessionis solum occupavere. Mox limite acto, 4 pro- 
motisque prsesidiis, sinus imperii, et pars provincioa 
habentur. 

NOTES ON SECTION XXIX. 

1 Batavi.] — Cassar places the Batavi in the island formed by the 
Maas, Vhaal, and Rhine, " Mosa, parte quadam ex Rheno recepta, 
quse appellatur Vahalis, insulam efficitBatavorum." — Bell. Gall. iv. 10. 

The Over-Betuive and Neder-Betuwe still preserve the name. 
Probably, they also fix the locality. 

This is considerably distant from Hesse, the centre of the Chatti. 
Nevertheless, the origin ascribed to the Batavi by Tacitus must be 
taken as we find it. 

Upon the principle of considering all migrations along a navi- 
gable water- course, where the population of the intermediate parts 
differs from that of the extremities, as fluviatile, I consider that the 
Batavi came from the country of the Chatti in boats. Still, Hesse is 
on the Weser rather than on the Rhine. 

Hitherto there are but few complications. 

A slight difficulty arises from certain passages in Dion. He 
speaks of the merits and numbers of the Batavian cavalry. This 
is not what we expect from the occupants of a small island. 

A greater arises when we try to reconcile the statement of Tacitus 
with the present state of the Dutch language. The Dutch of 
Holland is a Platt-Deutsch dialect, nowhere more so than in Over 
and Neder Betuwe. 

The language of the Hessians (or modern Chatti) is High German. 

Again — the name Batavi extended farther than the insula (in- 
sulce) Batavorum, at least as early as the time of Ptolemy ; since 
that writer mentions Leyden-=A.ovy6hivov Baragwv. Now Aovyo- 
cjeivov (Lug-dunum) is not only Keltic in respect to its termination 
-dunum, but was also the name of the unequivocally Gallic town 
Lyons (Lug- 



102 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

Lastly — although we can, by considering the Batavian Chatti 
to have been an inconsiderable and intrusive population, get over 
the difficulty arising out of the High-German dialect of the Chatti, 
and the Platt-Deutsch of the present people of Holland, we are not 
at liberty to do so. According to Tacitus, the Batavi were so far 
from standing alone, that the Caninefates were in the same category, 
— " Caninefates, . . . . ea gens partem insulse colit, origine, lingua, 
virtute par Batavis, numero superantur" — Hist. iv. 15. 

For a further notice of the Batavi, see Epilegomena, § Baitl and 
Subatti. 

• Mattiacorum.~\ — The mention of the warm baths of the Mattiaci — 
" Mattiaci in Germania fontes calidi trans Rhenum " (Pliny, xxxi. 2), 
— fixes them in the neighbourhood of Wisbaden. This is Zeuss's 
inference ; and there seems no good reason for refining on it. The 
fact of a mixed army of Chatti, Usipii, and Mattiaci, besieging 
Mayeuce confirms this view. " Maguntiaci obsessores mixtus ex 
Chattis,Usipiis, Mattiacis exercitus." — Tac.Hist.iv. 37 — Zeuss, p. 09. 

3 Decumates agros.~\ — The Decumates agri were, in the time of 
Caesar, a debatable land between the Gauls and the Germans. 
By the time of Tacitus it had been appropriated by Borne. 

Xiebuhr expressly states that, in the reigns of Augustus and 
Tiberius, Suabia was not yet subject to Borne ; his reason being 
that no mention is made of any attacks upon Germany south of 
the Lahn. Although this view rests upon negative evidence, and 
is qualified by the statement that all that is known about this war 
is vague and indefinite, the a priori probabilities are in favour of 
it, and it would be hypercritical to refine upon it. 

Domitian's actions in Germany are, probably, undervalued. 
Niebuhr mentions his war with the Chatti about the Maine. He 
also admits the evidence of medals as to the title of Germanicus 
borne by Domitian ; but he demurs to the evidence of Martial as to 
its being deserved ; adding that " the historians are unanimous that 
those victories were not realities, though they cannot be wholly 
fictitious." In the subsequent lecture, he supplies the additional 
statement that the " Arm Flavice, the name of a place on the military 
road from the Maine to Augsburg, proves that, probably under Domi- 
tian, the Bomans had already taken possession of that sinus imperii." 
He adds, in a note, that Frontinus (Strateg. i. 3, 10) expressly 



NOTES ON SECTION XXIX. 103 

ascribes the construction of the limes Bomanus to Domitian. Why- 
then use such epithets as probably ? Nine-tenths of the admitted 
facts in history, is less supported by evidence than the reduction of 
the Decumates agri, anterior to the reign of Nerva. This is a 
point to which even the present passage bears testimony. 

Under Nerva there was a " little war in Suabia, the only trace of 
which exists in an inscription, in which mention is made of a vic- 
toria Suevica." This was in 97 or 89, a.d. — Niebuhr's Lectures. 

Under Trajan and Adrian, the relations between Rome and Ger- 
many were peaceful. — Ditto. 

In the reign of Antoninus Pius " we hear of a defensive war 
against the Chatti." — Ditto. 

The great Marcomannic war characterized the reign of Aurelius 
Antoninus. In this, the tribes on the Decumatian frontier took 
some, but not the main, part. This was chiefly in the hands of the 
Germans of the Slavonic Marches — the agri Decumates being a 
Gallic or Romano- Gallic one. 

Commodus purchased an absence from hostilities, and Severus, 
probably, overawed them. At any rate, we hear nothing of German 
wars in his reign. 

One of the titles of Caracalla presents us, for the first time, with 
the important epithet Alemannicus. How it was earned we learn 
from the following extract — " Antoninus, Caracalla dictus .... 
Alernannos, gentem populosum, ex equo mirifice pugnantem, prope 
Maenum amnem devicit." — Aur. Victor, de Caes. c. 21. 

This is the first time the important name Alemanni occurs, and 
for that reason the notice of the agri Decumates has been brought 
down thus low (a.d. 215) ; since the agri Decumates, and the parts 
to the north and east of them, form the great Alemannic area. 

Further notice of these Germans will be found in Epilegomena, 
§ Alemanni. 

In saying that " in the time of Tacitus the agri Decumates had 
been appropriated by Rome," I mean not that it was settled, or 
organized, but that it was kept as a March or military frontier. A 
debatable land of this kind is the Suevic Waste, as described by 
Caesar. I believe that at the present moment a portion of the 
Austrian and Ottoman frontier is in this condition, — viz., Turkish 
Croatia, between Austrian Croatia, Herzegovina, Bosnia, and 
Slavonia. 

Politically, the Decumates agri coincide with the modern Duchy of 



104 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

Baden, three-fourths of Wurtemburg, Hohenzollern, and a small 
corner of Bavaria. 

Physically, they form the district of the Black Forest and the 
Rauhe Alpe, and consist of a table-land, containing the head-waters 
of the Neckar. 

4 Limits ado.] — Was this limes a ditch, wall, or rampart, or was 
it a physical boundary ; in other words, does limes mean an artificial 
or a natural line of demarcation 1 The reference to Frontinus in 
the previous note partially answers this. The limes was an artificial 
boundary. 

Between the bend of the Neckar and the upper part of the river 
Altmuhl, in the neighbourhood of Ohringen, are the remains of a 
fortified ditch. On the Upper Altmuhl they can be traced afresh ; 
and they re-appear on the Danube, between Pforing and Kelheim. 
Part or the whole of this is called the Teufelsmauer, or DeviVs Wall. 
The inference that it is of Roman origin is unexceptionable. The 
exact line, however, has not, I believe, been worked out. Neither 
has its connection or wo?i-connection with the Pfahl-Graben. 

The Pfahl-Graben is a similar line, running at nearly right angles 
with the river Lahn, between Giessen and Ortenburg. 

For practical purposes, a rough conventional line will do as well 
as a real one. This may be drawn so as to make the limes run from 
the Maine to Kelheim, i.e., from the junction of the Maine and Rhine, 
to the junction of the Altmuhl and Danube. This gives to the 
Romans rather more than Zeuss, and rather less than Niebuhr allows 
them. 



XXX. Ultra hos Chatti 1 initium sedis ab Hercynio 
saltu 2 inchoant, non ita effusis ac palustribus locis, 
ut cetera? civitates, in quas Germania patescit : clurant 
siquiclem colles, paullatimque rarescunt : et Chattos 
suos saltus Hercynius prosequitur simul atque de- 
ponit. Duriora genti corpora, stricti artus, minax 
vultus, et major animi vigor. Multum (ut inter Ger- 
manos) rationis ac solertice : prasponere electos, audire 
prsepositos, nosse ordines, intelligere occasiones, dif- 



NOTES ON SECTION XXX. 105 

ferre impetus, disponere diem, vallare noctem, for- 
tunam inter dubia, virtutem inter certa numerare : 
quodque rarissimum, nee nisi ratione disciplines con- 
cessum, plus reponere in dnce, quam in exercitu. 
Omne robur in pedite, quern super arma ferramentis 
quoque et copiis onerant. Alios ad prcelium ire videas, 
Chattos ad bellum : rari excursus et fortuita pugna. 
Equestrium sane virium id proprium, cito parare 
victoriam, cito cedere. Velocitas juxta formidinem, 
cunctatio propior constantly est. 

NOTES ON SECTION XXX. 

1 Chatti.'] — The" two chief ethnological facts connected with this 
name are : — 

1. That Chatti and Hesse are one and the same word. 

2. That the Chatti of Tacitus are the Suevi of Caasar. 

The propriety of spelling the word with an -h-, and of writing 
Chatti rather than Catti, is indicated by the Greek forms, Xdrroi, 
and Xdrrai, Kctrroi or KaVrat being nowhere found, though 
in some of the newer and more inferior MSS. of Pliny and Tacitus 
Catti is the reading. 

Just as the ch in Chauci becomes in German the h in Hoeing, so 
does the ch in Chatti become the h in Hesse. 

The change from t to s is the same that occurs in the High German 
form wasser as opposed to the Low German water. 

All this is a matter which has been generally received by those 
who first worked it out, viz., the German philologists, Zeuss, Grimm, 
and others. Whether, however, the real nature of the change has 
been explained, or rather whether any change at all has taken place, 
is uncertain. As far as I can ascertain the views of the writers in 
question, their opinion seems to be that those Hessians of Hesse who 
coincided with the ancient Chatti, called themselves by that name 
(Chatti). If so, the old form has changed into the new one, and 
the word which was now Hesse was once Chatti, the change having 
taken place on Hessian ground, and under the influence of time 
alone. 

This is not the view which the present writer adopts. He sees 
no grounds for believing that the Hessians ever used, as their own 



106 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

designation, any other form than the one in h- and s-. Hence to 
say that Hesse came from Chatti is like saying that wasser came from 
water; the truth being that the one was the High, the other the 
Low German form. 

Admitting this, we gain something more than a barren fact. We 
infer that, in the particular case of the Chatti, at least, the authori- 
ties of Tacitus were Loio Germans ; a view confirmed not only by 
the a priori probabilities of the case, but by several other similar 
points of internal evidence. 

That the Chatti of Tacitus are the Suevi of Ctesar, is grounded 
upon the — 

a. Absence of the name Chatti in the Bellum Galiicum : though 
they were the people most immediately in contact with Gaul. 

b. The history of the war with Ariovistus. 

c. The magnitude of the two populations ; each requiring too 
large an area to be in juxtaposition with one another within the 
assignable limits. 

d. The absence of the evidence of any considerable movements in 
the way of conquest or migration between the times of Caesar and 
Strabo, this latter writer mentioning the Chatti. 

Grimm, who, as a Hessian, has entered upon the minute ethnology 
of his native country con amore, has added to these reasons, and 
found confirmations of their identity in the local legends of Hesse. 
No reader acquainted with the vitality of old bye-words, and with 
the metamorphoses of popular stories, will think the following points 
of evidence unworthy of record. 

a. Let the word Chatti, originally Low German, but now Roman, 
give rise to a nickname (Schimpf-wort), applicable to the Hessians. 
Let them be called dogs or whelps, according to the translation of 
the root of cat-ul-us. Let such a name apply to both the Hessians 
and the Suabians. As far as this goes, it goes towards the connec- 
tion of the two by means of the common name Catti. 

Now a nickname (Schimpfwort) of the Hessians is Hund-Hessen or 
Dog Hessians (Hound Hessians') : and a nickname {Schimpfwort') of 
the Suabians is blinde Schivab =or blind Suabian — even as puppies 
are blind at birth. 

Everything in ethnology is a conflict of difficulties ; and it 
must not be concealed that a grave objection lies against the 
identification of the Chatti and Suevi, in the fact that with the 
ancient writers subsequent to Caesar, there is a mention of the Suevi 



NOTES ON SECTION XXX. 107 

as well as the Chatti, and in modern geography, there is a Suabia as 
well as a Hesse. 

1 believe that the difficulty is diminished by the § on the>SWvi in 
the Upilegomena. 

To the question, why did Csesar call the Catti Suevi? the 
answers are of two kinds. 

1. It may be said that the name had changed in the interval ; 
either by the preponderance of a different branch of the Confedera- 
tion, or by some other means. 

2. It may be said that the two names belonged to different 
languages, and that Suev- was the name by which the Chatti were 
known to Caesar's informants, the Gauls ; just as the Kymry are 
known to the English by the name of Welsh. 

The latter view is the one adopted by the present writer. 
That Suevi was- the Gallic name of the Germans of the Middle 
Ehine, I feel certain. Whether it was exclusively Gallic, i.e., 
foreign to these same Germans themselves, will be considered in 
the § just referred to. 

2 Hereynio saltu.~\ — The language from whence the first notice of 
the Hercynian range (whether of mountains or woods) was taken, 
is probably the Keltic ; at least no derivation is so probable as the 
one indicated by Zeuss — erchynn= elevated, erchynedd= elevations. 

If so, the portion of the range to which it applied would be the 
western, rather than the eastern extremity ; a matter of some im- 
portance, since the fact of its having been first used by Greeks 
would suggest the contrary notion. As it is, however, we must 
suppose that the term reached Aristotle or his informants just as 
the words Alp, Kelt, or Gaul (TdXaTai) did. 

The Hercynian forest, as delineated by Csesar, only partially 
follows the line of the Danube. There is, however, a tract in physi- 
cal geography with which it coincides entirely. This is the system 
of highlands or mountains, which forms the northern boundary 
of the valley of the Danube. , Hence, from west to east, the line 
of the southern limit of the tract in question runs from Baden 
(Rauraci), where the river-system is that of the Rhine, along the 
highlands of Wurtemburg (Decumates agri), Franconia, Bohemia, 
Moravia, and Upper Hungary. Here the bend to the left (north) 
takes place ; in other words, we have the long flat valley of the 
Theiss (Tibiscus) intervening between the mountain-range and the 



108 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

Danube, instead of the smaller and -more elevated ones of the Naab 
(in Bavaria), the March (in Moravia), and the Waag and Gran 
(in Upper Hungary). After this, however, a second bend, not known 
to Ceesar, takes place, and the forest-range, after encircling Hungary, 
re-approaches the Danube in Transylvania. 

Now the system of mountains which has taken us through 
the countries enumerated, is as follows : — The highlands of the 
Black Forest, the Bauhe Alpe (Abnoba mons), their continuation 
to the Fichtel-Gebirge, the Bbhnierwald Gebirge (Gabreta silva), 
the Wilde Gebirge (Hercynii montes), the Yablunka Gebirge {Luna 
silva), the Carpathian mountains (Askiburgius mons), their southern 
offset to the Danube (Sarmatici montes). Here the turn occurs ; 
and the forest follows the eastern direction of the Carpathians, which, 
after taking in the ancient maps the name of Alpes Bastarnicse, 
approach the Danube, and divide Transylvania from Wallachia. 



XXXI. Et aliis Germanorum populis usurpatum 
rara. et privata cujusque audentia, apud Chattos in 
consensum vertit, ut primum adoleverint, crinem bar- 
bamque summittere, 1 nee, nisi hoste eseso, exuere vo- 
tivum obligatumque virtuti oris habitum. Super 
sanguinem et spolia, revelant frontem, seque " turn 
deraura pretia nascendi retulisse, clignosque patria. ac 
parentibus " ferunt. Ignavis et imbellibus manet 
squalor. Fortissimus quisque ferreum insuper anulum 
(ignominiosum id genti) velut vinculum gestat, donee 
se csede hostis absolvat. Plurimis Chattorum hie placet 
habitus. Jamque canent insignes, et hostibus simul 
suisque monstrati : omnium penes bos initia pugna- 
rum : base prima semper acies, visu nova. Nam ne 
in pace quidem vultu mitiore mansuescunt. Nulli 
domus, aut ager, aut aliqua cura : prout ad quemque 
venere, aluntur : prodigi alieni, contemptores sui : 
donee exsanguis senectus tarn durse virtuti impares 
faciat. 



NOTE ON SECTION XXXI. 109 

NOTE ON SECTION XXXI. 

1 Crinem barhamque summittereJ] — The whole evidence of anti- 
quity is to the abundant locks of the Germans, and to their yellow 
hue. From the customs of some of the Frisian or Norse popu- 
lation, especially that of the supposed Norse settlements of Mol- 
querum and Hindelopen in Friesland, as they appear in the 
twelfth and thirteenth centuries, it is probably that this golden or 
flaxen hue was artificially heightened, i.e., by alkaline washes of 
soda or potash ley. The likelihood of this must be borne in 
mind when we consider the extent to which the present prepon- 
derance of dark or brown hair amongst many Germanic popula- 
tions is referable to a real change of colour ; inasmuch as it 
possibly may be accounted for by the disuse of the habit of blanch- 
ing it. 

In all ethnological questions connected with the colour and 
texture of the hair, the customs of the country, in respect to the 
dressing of it, should be carefully attended to. Thus amongst the 
islanders of more than one part of the South Sea and Indian 
Ocean, where the hair is naturally jet-black, there is the practice 
of washing the head in ash, or lime-water — which gives it a red 
tinge. Hair, thus discoloured, has been described by excellent 
writers as being red. 

The population wherein really, and naturally, red hair prepon- 
derates, is not German, but Ugrian ; the Votiak, and other Finns 
of the Volga, being pre-eminently irvppot ; and, I think it likely 
that when we hear of Germans being thus distinguished (i.e., as 
red rather than yettoiv-h&'ired), these alkaline washes may have 
had something to do with the epithet. Such are common. Silius 
Italicus calls the Batavian " rufus Batavus." — iii. 608. More ex- 
press still is the following extract from Galen : — Ovtmq yovv riveg 
ovofxd^ovcn roi/g Vipfiavovg £avdovg, Kal toi yt ovk ovrag ^avOovg, idv 
aKpi€(ii)c tiq ideXoi kolXew, dXkd ivvppovg. 

That long hair was generally an honourable ornament, we infer 
from its being amongst the Franks a sign of being a freeman ; 
whereas, to have the hair clipped, was a degrading punishment. At 
the same time, as this very passage implies, the German modes of 
wearing it were various. Herodian mentions the tcovpd ruv Vep- 
juaiw (iv. 7) ; and Seneca the rufus crinis et coactus in nodum apud 
Germanos. — De Ira. c. 26. 



110 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

XXXII. Proximi Chattis certum jam alveo Rhe- 
num, quique terminus esse sufficiat, Usipii 1 ac Tencteri 2 
colunt. Tencteri super solitum bellorum decus eque- 
stris discipline arte prrecellunt. Nee major apud 
Chattos peditum laus, quam Tencteris equitum. Sic 
instituere majores, posteri imitantur. Hi lusus in- 
fantium, haec juvenum aemulatio, perseverant senes : 
inter familiam, et penates, et jura successionum, equi 
traduntur: excipit films, non, ut cetera, maximus 
natu, sed prout ferox bello et melior. 

NOTES ON SECTION XXXII. 

1 Usipii] — Another form of the word is Usip-et-es. 

1 quite agree with Zeuss in his suggestion, that this -et, is the 
Keltic sign of the plural, and that this is the reason why it occurs in 
Caesar throughout, whilst in Tacitus, it is the prevalent reading only 
once (Ann. i. 51). 

Caesar's notice of the Usipii takes precedence of all others. He 
places them on the Lower Rhine, making them conterminous (or 
nearly so) with the Suevi, Sicambri, Tencteri, Ubii, and Bructeri. 

The graver complications begin with the notice of Ptolemy. A 
population with a name so like Usipii as Ov'iairoi, is placed by that 
writer as far south as the frontier of the Helvetian Desert — that is, 
we identify the two names. The necessity, however, for doing so is 
doubtful. The name is, probably, Gallic. 

2 Tencteri.'] — The history of the Tencteri is nearly that of the 
Usipii, and vice versa. 

Pressed by the Suevi (Chatti) they crossed the Rhine ; were defeated 
by Caesar near the junction of the Maas ; and escaped, as a remnant, 
by retracing their steps, and re-passing the Rhine to the country 
of the Sigambri. A line drawn due east of Cologne, would pass 
through the original country of the Ubii, Tencteri, and Usipii. 
They were Germans (i.e., of the High German, or of the Platt- 
Deutsch division) rather than Saxons or Frisians. 

According to Dion and Floras, Drusus conquered the Tencteri 
and Usipii on his way to the Chatti; the latter being on the northern 
bank of the river Lippe. The complement to these two notes is 
to be found in the Epilegomena, %Vispi. 



NOTES ON SECTION XXXIII. Ill 

XXXIII. Juxta Tencteros Bructeri 1 olim occur- 
rebant : nunc Chainavos 2 et Angrivarios 3 immigrasse 
narratur, pulsis Bructeris ac penitus excisis, vici- 
narum consensu nationum, sen superbise odio, seu 
prsedse dulcedine, seu favore quodam erga nos dec- 
rum : nam ne spectaculo quidem proelii invidere ; 
super lx. millia, non armis telisque Romania, sed, 
quod magnificentius est, oblectationi oculisque cecide- 
runt. Maneat quseso, duretque gentibus, si non amor 
nostri, at certe odium sut : quando, urgentibus imperii 
fatis, nihil jam prssstare fortuna majus potest, quam 
hostium discordiam. 

NOTES ON SECTION XXXIII. 

1 Bructeri.'] — Probable German forms of this word would be, in 
Anglo-Saxon Breochtware, in Old Saxon Briuchtuuari, in Frisian 
Brjuchtwara. 

My reason for believing that the syllable -eri, represents tbe second 
element in a compound word, and that that word was -ware=inha- 
bitants (as in Cantware=inhabitants of Kent) lies in the following 
extract from Beda — " Sunt autem Fresones, Rugini, Dani, Huni, 
antiqui Saxones, Boructuarii, sunt etiam alii perplures iisdem in 
partibus populi, paganis adhuc ritibus servientes." — Hist. Ecclesiast. 
v. 10. The same writer repeats the name more than once. 

Perhaps the same may have been the case with the form 
Tencteri=Tenctware. Be this as it may, notwithstanding the 
contraction, the e in Bructeri is short. It is written with e in 
Greek (BpovKrepoi), whilst in Latin we have the following lines of 
Sidonius Apollinaris — 

Toringus 



Bructerus, ulvosa vel quern Nicer alluit unda 
Prorumpit Francus. — Carm. vii. 324. 

The utter excision (penitus excisis) of the Bructeri, is an over- 
statement. Neither was their expulsion complete ; on the contrary, 
it was very partial. This we learn from the subsequent notices of 
the Bructeri, who are so far from being exterminated that they are 
mentioned more than most other German tribes. 



112 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

Ptolemy divides them into the Bructeri Majores, and Bructeri 
mmores (BovvctKrepot fiei^orec and Bovoaicrepoi iXdrrovEQ or /ULicpoi) ; 
the Ems dividing them. 

In Nazarius' panegyric to Constantine, in the beginning of the 
fourth century, they are mentioned along with the Chamavi and 
Cherusci, as nations whom it was glorious to have conquered. 

Lastly, in the ninth and tenth centuries, we meet notices of the 
pagus Borahtra — ] )a 9 us Bortergo — pagxus Borotra — -pagus Boractron, 
and pagus Boratre, all meaning the same locality. 

The following passage fixes it still closer — ''Bruno magnus 
satrapa Saxonum cum nobili comitatu in provincia Boructuariorum 
pernoctans in vico Ratingen . .; in quadam Boructuariorum villa 
Velsenberg nomine." — Vita S. Swiberti ap. Leibn. i. 20, 21. 

A line drawn from Munster to Cologne would pass through part 
of the country of the Bructeri ; a country of which the outline seems 
to have been very irregular. 

They are on the confines of the Frisian, Old Saxon, and Platt- 
Beutsch areas, and it is difficult to say to which they belonged. I 
think the Old-Saxon places in -urn (if such there be) occur within 
their area. 

2 Chamavos.] — Ptolemy's form is Kalfxai. 

The present town of Ham, in Westphalia, probably preserves the 
name and fixes the original locality of the Chamavi. 

But either the name or the people spread as far as the Rhine and 
Ysel ; and the Chamavian and Salian Franks become mentioned 
together. That the extension was real — i.e., that of the people, and 
not merely of the import of the name — is probable. They have 
already encroached on the Bruct-eri. 

In the Tabula Peutingeriana we find chamavi qui elpranci. 
Zeuss, reasonably, considers this to mean et phranci. 

A tract of land, at the present day, extending down the Ysel to 
the neighbourhood of Beventer, is called Hame-land ; and it is men- 
tioned in early documents as " pagus Saxonise Hamalant — in Sutfeno 
(South Fen=Zutphen) in pago Hameland — in Buisburg in pago 
Hameland — in Bauindre (Beventer) in eodem pago Hameland — 
abbatiam Altene juxta Bhenum flumen in pago Hamaland" 

This implies a great displacement of Bructeri. 

It had taken place before the reign of the Emperor Julian. — 
Xaudtwv yap /nil fiovXofievwi' ahyvajov iari rr)v rfjeBpiravvLKfJQ vrjaov 



NOTES ON SECTION XXXIII. 113 

oiToiToiAtriav errl rot 'Piopdiitd (ppovpia c)ta7rf/i7rfo-0ai. — 'Y7rtce^,dpi]v /uev 
fioipav tov ~Xa\i(ov 'itivovQ, Xafid€ovQ 8i i^fiXana. — Eunap. in Exc.Leg. 

Ausonius makes the middle syllable long : 

Accedent vires, quas Francia, quasque Chamaves 
Germanique tremunt. — Mosella, 434. 

The branch of the Germanic population to which the original 
Chamavi belonged, was almost certainly the Old Saxon. 

Amongst the obscurest of the traditionary heroes of the Westpha- 
lian and Hanoverian Germans is Ham, whose Latinized name is 
Ammitts. This Ammius may.,, or may not, have been the eponymus 
of the Cham-ayi. 

A shade is thrown over the common origin of the different Cham- 
avi by the possibility of cham- being a geographical term ; in which 
case it might apply to different populations, irrespective of ethnolo- 
gical identity. 

Ptolemy has, in the parts between the Danube and Thuringia, not 
only a population called Uappai-tcdpiroi, but one called 'AEpagai- 
Ka.jj.Tvoi also — a sure sign of the words being compound. 

Now Zeuss tells us that he finds — and from the context his re- 
mark either applies, or should apply, to this locality — in old docu- 
ments not only a place called Cham, but Marcha Chambe* — p. 121. 

Add to this the root Ham- in Ham-hurg. For the Chamavi as 
colonists, see Epilegomena, § Chattuarii. 

3 Angrivarios.~\ — This is a compound name ; the latter elements 
being the ware in Cantware=occwpantfs, inhabitants. 

The present town of Engern, near Herford, in Westphalia, the 
supposed scene of Varus's defeat, probably preserves the name, and 
fixes the locality of the Angri-varii. But the area was a wide one. 

That this identity is not taken up on light grounds is shown by 
the following extracts. 

Generalis habet populos divisio ternos, 
Insignita quibus Saxonia floruit olim ; 
Nomina nunc remanent, virtus antiqua recessit. 
Denique Westfalos vocitant in parte manentes 
Occidua, quorum non longe terminus amne 
A Pdieno distat : regionem solis ad ortum 
Inhabitant Osterliudi, quos nomine quidam 
* See Epilegomena, § Parmacampi. 

I 



114 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

Ostvalos alio vocitant, confiuia quorum 
Infestant conjuncta suis gens perfida Sclavi.* 
Inter prreclictos media regione morantur 
Angarii, populus Saxonum tertius ; horum 
Patria Francorum terris sociatur ab austro, 
Oceanoque eadem conjungitur ex aquilone. 

Poeta Saxo ad an. 772. 

The Ang-arii separated the East- and West-phalias. 
Or, the Oster-liudi from the Wester-liudi. 

Or, the East-Saxons from the West-Saxons, a German Essex from 
a German We-ssex ; the Angrarii being, in reality, a German 
Middlesex. 

" Rex amne (Wisura) trajecto cum parte exercitus ad Ovacrum 
fluvium contendit, ubi ei Hessi, unus e primoribus Saxonum cum 
omnibus Ostfalais occurrens, et obsides, quos rex imperaverat, dedit 
et sacramentum fidelitatis juravit. Inde regresso, cum in pagum 
qui Bucki vocatur pervenisset, Angrarii cum suis primoribus occur- 
rerunt, et sicut Ostfalai, juxta quod imperaverat, obsides ac sacra- 
menta dederunt . . . Turn demum Westfalaorum obsidibus acceptis, 
ad hicmandum in Francia revertitur." — Annal. Einhardi ad an. 775, 
Pertz i. 155. "Tunc domnus Carolus . . . perrexit usque Obacrum 
fluvium. Ibi omnes Austreleudi Saxones venientes cum Hassione, 
et dederunt obsides . . . venerunt Angrarii (al. Angarii) in pago 
qui dicitur Bucki una cum Brunone et reliquis optimatibus eorum 
et dederunt ibi obsides, sicut Austrasii . . . Stragem ex eis fecit, et 
praxlain multam conquisivit super Westfalaos, et obsides dederunt, 
sicut et alii Saxones." — Annal. Lauriss. ad an. 775, Pertz i. 144. 

The following forms approach the supposed modern equivalent 
{Engem) closely ; " Anger i in orientali regione — Angaria occiden- 
tal — Angari in pago Logni — Angeri in occidentali regione — An- 
garia occidentali in pago Nithega — Angari in pago Leri." They 
also prove the magnitude of the area. 

They also verify the origin of the form Bruct-m out of the more 
manifest compound Bruct-ware; as well as the supposed origin of 
Tenct-ert out of Tenct-tvare. 

The identity of the Angrivarian locality with Engern being a 
point upon which much turns, these details have been given in full. 



* Observe tbe early notice of the Western Slavonians. 



NOTES ON SECTION XXXIV. 115 

XXXIV. Angri varies et Chaniavos a tergo 1 Dul- 
gibini 2 et Chasuari 3 cludunt, aliseque gentes liaud 
perinde niemoratse. A fronte Frisii 4 excipiunt. " Ma- 
joribus minoribusque 5 Frisiis" vocabulum est, ex moclo 
virimn : utrseque nationes usque ad Oceanum Rheno 
prsetexuntur, ambiuntque immensos insuper lacus, et 
Romanis classibus navigates. Ipsum quinetiam Ocea- 
num ilia tentavimus : et superesse adhuc Herculis 
columnas fama vulgavit : sive adiit Hercules, seu quid- 
quid ubique inagnificuni est, in claritatem ejus referre 
consensimus. Nee defuit audentia Druso Germanico : 
sed obstitit Oceanus in se simul atque in Herculem 
inquiri. Mox nemo tentavit : sanctiusque ac reve- 
rentius visum, de actis deorum credere, quam scire. 

NOTES ON SECTION XXXIV. 

1 A tergo Dulgibini et Chasuari.] — This must mean north (and, 
perhaps, a little north-west) rather than due east or north. 

A fronte Frisii — This must mean west (or north-west) ; and 
to do this there must be a considerable irregularity and extension of 
frontier on either one side or the other. This is rather forcing the 
text. 

At the same time it is all that is required ; and when we con- 
sider that by allowing this we get — 

a. The A ngri- varii in Engern, 

b. The Cham-&\i in Hamm, 

c. The Dulg-vfomi in Dulm-en ; and — 

d. The Chas-u&vi on the Rase, it cannot well be considered too 
much. 

"Dulgibini. — In Ptolemy, AovXyovfxvwi. The word is, probably, a 
compound ; although no satisfactory explanation of its elements has 
been given. Zeuss suggests that the dulg-=ihe Icelandic dolgr= 
enemy, dolg= struggle, Anglo-Saxon dolg, Old High German tolc ; 
whilst the gibin is from the same root as the guber- in Guber-ni= 
gambar—bold, the m being lost in the same way that the n of 
standan is lost in studan. 

T 9. 



116 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

In respect to their locality, Ptolemy places them next to the 
Aa.KKo€dpoot. 

My own belief is that their name is preserved, and their locality 
fixed by the present Westphalian town called Didmen — a form suf- 
ficiently near Ptolemy's AovKyovuvLOL to be admitted. 

3 ChasuarL] — Like Angri-varii a compound name, and, probably, 
that of the occupants of the banks of the river Hase, especially the 
parts about Hase-lunde. 

Now there is another name so near that of the Ghas-uari that, 
although not mentioned by Tacitus, it requires notice. It is that of 
the Chatt-uarii. 

The German form of this (a real and known form) was Heel-ware 
=occupants of the country of Ghatti. 

Strabo and Paterculus alone mention this people — Strabo as 
XciTTov-dpioi, Paterculus as Attu-arii. 

For a fuller notice of this question, and for the ylW-uarian colonies 
see EpUegomena, § Chattuarii. 

4 Frisii. — Except political importance, the Frisians have all the 
elements of ethnological interest. 

To the Dutchman and German they are deserving of attention, 
because they represent the native Germanic type in its purest and 
least modified form. Their fen localities have kept them from 
intermixture of blood : they have also preserved for them, through 
a long series of vicissitudes, a considerable amount of political in- 
dependence. 

The Scandinavian sees in the Frisian language, the Germanic 
tongue most allied to his own ; the descendant of that Gothic 
language out of which the Icelandic, or Old Norse, was developed. 

To the Englishman they are of pre-eminent interest. The Fri- 
sians of Heligoland are British subjects. But, besides this, there 
is another series of facts. 

a. The mother-tongue of the present English, the Anglo-Saxon, 
is extinct on the Continent. It has been wholly replaced by a 
High German dialect as the literary language, and by the Platt- 
Deutsch as the speech of the country-people. 

b. The sister-tongue to the Anglo-Saxon — the Old Saxon of 
Westphalia — is similarly lost, and similarly replaced. 

c. The tongue next to these, in the order of affinity, is the Frisian, 



NOTES ON SECTION XXXIV. 117 

a form of the Gothic speech nearer our own language than either 
the Dutch of Holland, the Scandinavian dialects, or the High German. 

In another new and peculiar point of view, the Frisians claim 
notice. Their history is, to a certain extent, a physical history. 
Many branches of the stem to which they belong "have been lopped 
off by the hand of man, by war, by famine, by oppression bravely 
withstood. But others have given way to a stronger and more 
unconquerable power — that of Nature. It is the Frisian area that 
most of the great inundations of the North Sea have broken in 
upon. What Vesuvius has been to Campania, ./Etna to Sicily, Hecla 
to Iceland, the Ocean has been to Frisia. 

The proper complement to the ethnology of this branch, would 
be the physical history of the North Sea ; and this is what Cle- 
mens, the best investigator of the least known part of the family 
— the North Frisians — has sketched. 

The Frisians have ever been the people of a retiring frontier, 
i.e., whilst others have encroached on their occupancies, they have 
never, within the historical period, been successful invaders and 
permanent aggressors elsewhere. Not, at least, by land. By sea, 
the case may have been different ; so different, that in our own 
island much that passes for Anglo-Saxon in origin may be Frisian ; 
a matter to which a special notice has been dedicated.* 

On the west the Ocean ; on the north the Danes and Low Ger- 
mans ; on the south the Low Germans have been the encroachers. 

The fact of the Frisians having thus suffered from encroach- 
ment, rather than gained by aggression, has a practical bearing. 

Frisian occupancy may be inferred from certain characteristics, 
hereafter to be illustrated : and these characteristics we find in 
localities far beyond the present Frisian area. Now, had the 
Frisians been a family of conquerors, the inference would be that 
the introduction was recent, and that, upon some earlier occupancy, 
Frisian elements might have been engrafted. But as the truth is 
the reverse of this ; as the Frisians have habitually retreated rather 
than advanced, the conclusion is different ; and as Frisian n ames of 
geographical localities — for of this sort are the characteristics in 
question — may reasonably be assumed to denote Frisian occupancy 
anterior to that of the present dominant population. 

Of all the ancient names of German populations, the term Frisii 
has been the most permanent. Less altered in form than Chatti, as 
In the third edition of the English Language of the present writer. 



118 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

compared to Hesse, and applied to the population of its original area, 
it denotes the Frisii of Tacitus, the present Frieslanders of Friesland, 
■with a minimum amount of alteration. 

As to whether the name itself be German, it would be an unne- 
cessary refinement to doubt it. Nevertheless, the criticism which 
applies to the word Suevi is applicable to Frisii also. It is applied* 
hie ; but, although applicable, it by no means follows that it should 
be applied. By considering the term as Keltic a few difficulties re- 
specting the connection between the Frisii and Chauci might, per- 
haps, be removed. On the other hand, we have Pliny's word Frisia- 
bones ; a compound almost certainly German. 

The shadow of uncertainty that rests over the language to which 
the root Fris- belongs, is created by the fact of the Frisii being 
mentioned by Caesar, under the name now before us -. for Caesar's 
informants were Gauls, and, I am inclined to think that, as a gene- 
ral rule, the Gallic name of a Germanic population was different 
from the native one. 

Again ; the name of the national hero is so often the name of the 
people who are addicted to his cultus — in other words, the national 
hero is so often an eponymus to the nation — that when this is not 
the case, a slight presumption is raised against the name being 
indigenous, native, and vernacular. This is the case here. The 
great mythological Frisian is Finn. We should expect some such 
name as Fris. 

Thus, in the Traveller's Song, we have — 

" Fin Folc-walding 
[Weold] Fresna cynne — " 

or, 
"Finn, the son of Folcwalda 
(Ruled) the race of Frisians." 

All this, however, may be, and probably is, over-refinement. 

The later form which the word Frisii takes is one in -n-, the so- 
called weak form of the Gothic grammarians. Hence, whilst Tacitus, 
Pliny, Ptolemy, and Dion, write Frisii, Qplrrmoi, and (bpziaioi, Proco- 
pius has fypieruoveg. 

The Anglo-Saxon writers also use the form in -an ; e.g., Fresones 
in Beda, and Frisan in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. 

The form Frisia-bon-es, in Pliny, has been already noticed. It is 
clearly a compound. The power and original form of the second 



NOTES ON SECTION XXXIV. 119 

element is not so clear. Considering the nature of the Frisian 
habitats, I believe it to represent the word veen=fen. This, however, 
is but a guess. 

The Frisian characteristic alluded to above is — 

1. The great preponderance of compound words, ending in the 
equivalent to the English -ham, and German -helm, — e.g., Threeking- 
ham, Oppen-Aeim. 

2. The peculiar form this element takes. 

This is -urn, the h being omitted, and the vowel being u. 

In Friesland itself so abundant are these compounds of -urn, that 
two out of three (sixteen out of twenty-four) of the places noted in 
the map within a few miles of Leeuwarden, end in that element. * 

Zeeland. — Here but few words are compounded of the equivalent 
to -ham and -heim at all ; perhaps none except the word Ritt/iem ; 
which is in h and e. 

Thus we have the two extremes; i.e., the Frisian topography at 
its maximum in Friesland, and at its minimum in Zeeland. 

Between these two extremes the following is the order of transition. 

Groningen — Here the Frisian compound predominates, and that 
with the Frisian form. In the arrondissement of Appingadam only, 
we have eighteen names in -um. 

In Groningen, however, we find occasion to mention another 
Frisian characteristic — the omission of -n and -m at the end of 
words. Hence, all true Frisian compounds of -man end in -ma ; as 
Hette-mct and Halberts-ma ; whilst the numerous words that, in a 
fen-country, are compounded of -dam, take such forms as the follow- 
ing words in the arrondissement of Winschoten — Holwier-cZa (not 
-dam), Utwier-c?a, &c. 

Now in Winschoten, although the Frisian characteristic of the 
final -a be carried to a great extent, the forms in -um are few. In 
the next province — 

Drenthe — they do not occur at all. But Drenthe, like Winschoten, 
seems to be reclaimed land, and as such, the habitat of a population 
less aboriginal than that of Friesland and Groningen. 

Oberijssel. — a. Arrondissement of Zivolle. — Here we have three 
compounds of h-m, viz. : Blanken-7iam, Windes-7ieim, and Wils-wm 
— all three different ; one Saxon, one German, and one Frisian. 

* The map referred to is Van Langenheuzen's, a.d. 1843 ; the scale being 
a small quarto page to each Province. No topographical knowledge beyond 
what is thus supplied is pretended to. 



120 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

b. Arrondissement of Deventer. — One compound in -um, Hess-zm. 

c. Arrondissement of Almelo. — Three compounds — Ootmars-wm; 
Rent-wm, and Ross-?<m. 

Notwithstanding this diminution of Frisian characteristics, there 
is between Almelo and Ommen a Vrisen-veen = Frisian fen. 

Gelderland. — a. Arrondissement of Arnhem. — Here Avnhem takes 
the form in hem. On the contrary, HelsM??i and Renkwm occur, 
und so do Benneko?/* and Ellekom. 

c. Arrondissement of Nimeguen. — Forms in -um rare, if any. 

d. Arrondissement of Tiel. — Heukel-ww, Gellic-wm, and Ross- 
um. 

North Brabant. — Three or four forms in -um at most. 

b. Arrondissement of Zutphen. — Forms in -em almost (or wholly) 
to the exclusion of those in -um — Loche»i, Zelhem. 

Limburg. — Here are four forms, Wessitwi, Sevenum, W&nsum, 
and Qttevsum ; but they occur in the northern arrondissement (that 
of Roermonde) only, and that in contact with Gvoet-hem and Baex- 
hem. 

Utrecht. — Utter, or nearly utter, absence of Frisian forms. 

So uth 11 o 11 a ad. — D it to. 

North Holland. — a. In the arrondissement of Amsterdam. — Bla- 
Ticum, HelinersMWi, Bussum. 

b. In the arrondissement of Hoorn. — Wogmm. 

Notwithstanding the paucity of Frisian forms, part of North 
Holland is called West Friesland ; from which we may infer that, 
even though the termination -um be non-existent, there may have 
been a Frisian occupancy. 

But what shall we say to the converse of this 1 How far is the 
presence of such forms absolutely Frisian 1 

I can only say, in answer to this, that the Anglo-S&'x.on forms 
are regularly -ham, the Platt-Deutsch -hem, the High-German -heim, 
and the Norse -jem (-yem) ; and that in England, Switzerland, 
Iceland, Sweden, and those parts of Germany, where the Frisian 
occupancy can fairly be presumed never to have extended, I have 
sought for the form -um in vain. 

Observe the Italics in the word ^.^o-Saxon. 

If any exception is to be made in favour of the termination 
-icm=~heim, and -ham, it is in favour of the Old Saxons. Two 
reasons stand for this. 

1. The Old Saxon omitted the h- in simple words, where it 



NOTES ON SECTION XXXIV. 121 

occurs in all the other Germanic tongues ; even the Anglo-Saxon 
and the Frisian. Thus their forms equivalent to — 

A.S. ENGLISH. O.S. 

hire = her = ir. 
hira = their = iro. 

2. Drat-wm, Stock-zm, Bokk-wm, occur in Old Saxon locali- 
ties. 

I admit this exception, and, although it is by no means . im- 
possible that either certain Old Saxon localities may once have 
been Frisian, or that Frisian colonies may have been located on 
the points in question, consider that the -um may have been Old 
Saxon as well as Frisian — but not anything else. 

To proceed. In Scandinavia, the termination in the root h-m 
at all, or in any form, is rare. The termination that replaces it 
is -by ; an important affix, and one which plays the same part in 
the minute ethnology of Scandinavia that -um does here. 

With this preliminary, we may investigate the northern portions 
of the Frisian area ; having begun with the extremities first. 

Sleswich and Holstein. — Just west of Tondern, about an English 
mile to the north, we have a hamlet called, for some distance, Bunder- 
by ; and south of this, for some distance, there is no place ending 
in -by. 

About four English miles to the north-west of Leek, we have a 
hamlet named Wees-by, and west of this no place ends in -by. 

About Hus-um is a remarkable starting-point. A new set of 
names comes in. These are only partially Frisian ; at the same 
time they are not Danish. Where these are not Frisian they are 
Piatt- Deutsch. 

However, between Husum, Bunder-6y, Wees-by, and the sea, all is 
Frisian — positively as well as negatively. 

Within these lines come Olz-hus-Mm, Bogel-t6??z, Lug-^m,Up-hus-2<m, 
Karl-tm, Ris-wra, Klint-wm, Barg-urn, Stad-wm, Dorp-zm, Bordel-um, 
Bakkel-ztm, Stukk-um, Hus-wm, and a little to the south-west of the 
line Rantr-wTO. 

What do we find beyond ? First let our attention be turned to 
the south, and south-east, so as to see whether they are reasons for 
connecting these Frisians of Sleswick with those of Hanover. 

South of Husum, a projecting block of low fertile marsh-land 
is bounded on two sides by the sea and the Eyder, and on the 



122 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

third by the road to Frederikstadt, and Schwabsted. Here but 
one place ends in -um, Bros-wm, on the sea. None end in -by. The 
nomenclature is Platt-Deutsch. Still, the single word Bros-wm 
indicates a Frisian population— to which it should be added, that 
the whole country is reclaimed land, consisting wholly of embanked 
marshes. This is the fertile country of Eydersted ; at present 
Platt-Deutsch. 

South of Eydersted and the Eyder comes Ditmarsh — the beloved 
native country of Niebuhr. It falls in two divisions — 

a. North Ditmarsh, of which Heide is the chief town, contains 
nothing ending in -um. On the contrary, several names are Platt- 
Deutsch. 

b. South Ditmarsh ; few or no forms in -um. 

But Ditmarsh only takes us southwards. The parts west of Husum 
require notice. The triangle formed by a line drawn from Husum 
to Sleswick, from Sleswick to Rendsburg, and from Rendsburg to 
the Eyder (this last being very irregular) gives a new area. 

Nothing ends in -um here. All that points towards Friesland is 
a drain named Fresen-delf, on the right bank of the river Tren, near 
Schwabsted ; and even this is on the very western extremity of the 
parts marked out. 

Neither do any places end in -um between Sleswick, the Eckern- 
fjord, and Rendsburg. Hence, the Frisians of the parts between 
Husum and Tbndern are isolated. 

So much for the south and east. Let us now look to the north ; 
or rather to the north and east ; remembering that, in this direction, 
whatever is not Frisian will be Danish — not Platt-Deutsch. 

North. — Between Tondern and Ripen the places in -by are 
arranged in one, those in -um in another column. 

Oster-fo/. Hus-wm. 

Wiis-5?/. Ball-tm. 

Gammel-6?/. Woll-wm. 

Nor-fo/. Win-wm. 

'KohX-by. Nust-hus-wwi. 

Reis-6y. Bjerr-wm. 

Kirke-6y. 

Mol-ty. 

Meel-&y. 



The preponderance is in favour of the Danish form. Besides 



NOTES ON SECTION XXXIV. 123 

which, we have a place called Kier-gaard ; and as gaard=house in 
Danish, this is an additional element in that quarter. 

On the other hand the compound Kivke-by= Church-town, should 
be noticed : as it shows, that, in that case at least, the Danish name 
is posterior to the introduction of Christianity. I do not remember 
any such Frisian form as Tjerk-t«m (the Frisian equivalent to 
Kirke-by) ; a fact which gives us negative evidence in favour of the 
antiquity of the Frisian names. 

North-east. — For the square formed by lines drawn from Husuin 
to Sleswick, from Sleswick to Flensburg, from Flensburg to Leek, and 
from Leek to Husum, there is only one place in -urn, Bordel^tm, and 
as this is on the right bank of the Tren, it may be considered as 
belonging to the true Frisian area ; being its most western locality. 
Roughly speaking, the preponderating signs of Frisian occupancy 
cease when we pass "the Tren. 

West of this line, and in the series of angular projections formed 
by the Eckernfjord, the Slie, the Flensborg Fjord, the Apenrade 
Fjord, and the Hadersleven Fjord, we expect to find even fewer 
Frisian names than we found in the centre of the peninsula. Yet 
such is not the case. 

a. Between the Eckernfiord and the sea is an Qxn-um, and a 
Schwastr-wm. 

b. Between the Slie and the Fiensburg Fiord is a Wri-wm, and a 
Brunshol-wm. 

c. Between the Flensburg and Apenrade Fiords is a ~Ro\\-um ; 
though quite at the western (north-western) extremity. 

d. Between the Apenrade and Hadersleven Fiords are Bod-um 
and Lyg-ztm ; both on the eastern side. 

In the parts necessary to fill up the vacancy, and comprise the 
centre of North Sleswick, along with a part of South Jutland, 
bounded by lines drawn from Leek to Flensburg, from Flensburg to 
Kolding, from Kolding to Ripe, from Ripe to Tondern, and from 
Tondern to Leek, we have a few Frisian forms — Selli-wm-hauge, on 
the south-east of Kolding, and opposite the isle of Fyen, being the 
most eastern ; south of which, and also near the sea, is Stubb-wra. 

It is scarcely necessary to say that the distribution of the Frisian 
forms is remarkable. 

First, we have them to the exclusion of the Danish and Platt- 
Deutsch ones. 

Next, mixed with Danish forms in -by ; and — 



124 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

Thirdly, mixed with Platt-Deutsch forms of different descriptions. 

The distribution, however, to as far as it has hitherto gone, has 
applied to the Continent only, not to the islands. 

In those of the North Sea, or those on the western side, it is as 
follows : 

a. In Fbhr (which from being central it is convenient to begin 
with) we have Duns-im, Utters-w?», Hedehus-?t»i, Yits-um, Niebel-w?>i, 
Baldiks-wm, Yreks-um, Oevens-um, Midl-wm, Alkers-itm, Borgs-um, 
Toft-urn, Klint-um, 01ds-«»i, Duns-?t»i. 

b. In Sylt, Horn-urn, Mois-um, Arks-um, Keit-um, Tinn-wm — all 
in the sotcthern half of the island. 

c. In northern Homo, Toft-ww. 

d. In Fano, none. 

e. f. g. In Amrom (to the south of Sylt), in Pelvorm, and in Nord- 
stant, none. Here the names are Platt-Deutsch. 

If we now look back upon the distribution of local names in the 
Cimbric peninsula, we shall find that — 

a. There is a part purely Frisian, i.e., the parts between Tbndern 
and Husum. 

b. A part mixed with Danish, i.e., North Jutland. 

c. A part mixed with Platt-Deutsch, i.e., Ditmarsh ; and, besides 
these — 

d. Parts where there is an intermixture of different degrees of 
complexity of Frisian, Danish, and Platt-Deutsch. 

Now in the parts about Husum, i.e., the parts where the endings 
are most purely Frisian, the language is at the present moment 
Frisian — the North Frisian so-called. I have heard it spoken, 
and, imperfectly spoken it, myself this very year. 

And in the islands of the North Sea, and many parts about it, there 
either is North Frisian, or, has been so, within the memory of man. 

And in Eydersted and Ditmarsh it has been so within the his- 
torical period. 

Is this Frisian new or old 1 Have the populations who speak it 
encroached upon the other occupants of the peninsula or vice 
versa ? The latter is the case. Some of the reasons for this state- 
ment have already been given. They applied, however, only to the 
relations between the Low Germans and the Frisians. Those of the 
Danes require further notice. 

I. The North Frisian language is no recent introduction. — a. It 
falls into numerous dialects and sub-dialects. For the islands 



NOTES ON SECTION XXXIV. 125 

alone Clemens enumerates three, the Sylt, the Amrom, and the Fohr. 
On the continent, each parish has its peculiar variety. Some of 
these arise from intermixture of Danish and German ; but many 
are quite independent of anything of the sort. 

b. It is notably different from the Frisian of Holland. The two 
forms, though mutually intelligible, are not very easily understood. 

c. It is more like the Heligoland, than it is to the East or 
West Frisian. This would not be the case if the colony were of 
recent origin, unless we suppose that it was sent out from that small 
island. If the two dialects represented colonies from some common 
portion of the continent they would be more alike than they are. 

II. The compounds in -um are all old names. — a. They are never 
attached to such words as tjerke— church, &c. 

b. Few (I am afraid to say no) Frisian terminations are attached 
to Danish or German words. On the contrary, many complex Danish 
and German compounds are formed from simpler Frisian ones. 

III. The Danish has encroached upon the Frisian ever since the 
beginning of the historical period. No instance of the reverse has 
been recorded. 

The evidence of the North Frisian having once been continuous 
with the Frisian of Friesland and Westphalia, is satisfactory, the 
displacement of it having taken place within the historical period ; 
and its history is to be found in that of East Friesland, Oldenburg, 
Delmenhorst, and Bremen. 

Can we carry the Frisian as far as the Islands of the Baltic 1 ? 
In Fyen, and in Sealand, there are one or two names in -um. 

There is one direction, however, in which we may not carry it ; 
or, rather, there is one direction in which we must be careful not 
to carry it too far. This is that of the south-eastern parts of the 
Sleswick peninsula. The oldest occupants here were Slavonians; 
and the parts between Hamburg and Kiel, the Isle of Femern, the 
Isle of Alsen, and the opposite coast, must be considered as Sla- 
vonic in the first instance, Low German in the second, and Low 
German and Danish together in the third. 

The further extent of the original Frisian occupancy, the charac- 
teristics of the Frisian tongue, and the relations of that tongue to 
Scan dinavian, are considered in Epilegcmena, § ^ipaiai. 

5 Majoribus minoribusque.'] — Two populations of Germany are 
divided by more than one ancient writer into majores and minores 



12G THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

— the Prisii (as here) and the Bructeri ; each falling into two divi- 
sions so named. 

Probably, this denotes that either from migration or conquest, the 
continuity of the original area has been broken, and that whilst the 
majores represent the main stock, the minores form the outlying 
portion. 

Neither name (notwithstanding the present text) necessarily 
denotes size, since the great nation of the Visigoths was called 
Gothi minores. 

Populations other than German are so divided, e.g., the Scordisci. 



XXXV. Hactenus in occidentem Germaniam no- 
vimus. In septemtrionem ingenti flexu redit. Ac 
primo statim Chaucorum gens, 1 quamquam incipiat 
a Frisiis, ac partem litoris occupet, omnium, quas ex- 
posui, gentium lateribus obtenditur, donee in Chattos 
usque sinuetur. Tarn immensum terrarum spatium 
non tenent tantiiin Chauci, sed et implent : populus 
inter Germanos nobilissimus, quique magnitudinem 
suam malit justitia tueri : sine cupiditate, sine impo- 
tentia, quieti secretique, nulla provocant bella, nullis 
raptibus aut latrociniis populantur. Idque prseci- 
puum virtutis ac virium argumentum est, quod, 
ut superiores agant, non per injurias adsequuntur. 
Prompta tamen omnibus arma, ac, si res poscat, exer- 
citus i plurimum virorum equorumque : et quiescenti- 
bus eadem fama. 

NOTE ON SECTION XXXV. 

1 Chaucorum gens.] — The Ch, probably, represents the guttural 
ch of the Germans, as in audi, nock. In Greek it is X. 

That one of the letters c is aspirated is nearly certain. The only 
form where the k or its equivalent is wholly wanting, is in some MSS. 
(KavKoi) of Strabo. 

The forms with the first c aspirated (Chauci, XavKot) are to be 
found in Pliny, Tacitus, Suetonius. 



NOTE ON SECTION XXXV. 127 

Those with the second c aspirated (Cauchi, Kav%oi) occur in 
Velleius Paterculus, Spartianus, Ptolemy. 

Dion Cassius has both forms Xcivkiq and Kad^ot. 

Lucan and Glaudian divide the vowels and make them trisyllabic. 
This division of the vowels is of some importance in the history of 
ethnological conjecture, since it brings the forms Caijci and Caiici to 
a resemblance with the KuovXkoi of Strabo, and then with the Chabilci. 

The Chauci fell into two divisions — the Chauci minores between 
the Ems and Weser, the Chauci majores between the Weser and Elbe. 

It is safe to identify them with the Hoc-ingas of the Traveller's 
Song and Beowulf — the termination -ing being a patronymic, the 
-as the sign of the plural number, and the ch in Chauci equivalent 
to h in the same way that Ch—H in Ghatti and Hesse. 

It is safe, too, to consider the Chauci as members of the Frisian 
section of the Gothic stock. 

In the battle of Finnesburh, Hnoef, the eponymus of the Hano- 
verians, the son of Finn, the son of Folcwalda, has, as his queen, 
Hildeburg, the Hoc-ing. I do not consider that this gives us any- 
thing historical. All that it does is to connect the Chauci and 
Frisii (Hoc-ings and Frisians) by certain political relations ; and 
carry the area of their legendary localities as far as Hanover and 
Hildesheim. 

Considerable difficulties are involved in the statement that the 
Chauci extended as far as the frontier of the Chatti ; difficulties turn- 
ing upon the relationship between the Old Saxon and the Anglo- 
Saxon languages. 

If we join the Chauci and Chatti, we do one of two things ; we 
either — 

a. Disconnect the country of the Old-Saxons of Westphalia from 
that of the Anglo-Saxons : or else we — 

b. Enclose two such important populations as the Old Saxons and 
Anglo-Saxons within too small an area. 

Two other points connected with the ethnography of the Chauci 
still stand over. 

1. The discrepancy between Tacitus and Pliny as to their physical 
and political condition. What Tacitus says may be seen in the 
text. It is much the same as Velleius Paterculus had said before : — 
" Receptse Cauchorum nationes ; omnis eorum juventus, infinita 
numero, immensa corporibus, situ locorum tutissima, traditis armis 
. . ante imperatoris procubuit tribunal." 



128 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

Pliny's evidence, however, differs : — " Sunt in septemtrione visre 

nobis Chaucorum (gentes) Vasto ibi nieatu, bis dierum 

noctiumque singularuin intervallis, effusus in irnniensuui agitur 
Oceanus, aeternam operiens rerum naturce controversiam ; dubi- 
umque terrse sit, an parte in maris. Illic misera gens tumulos 
obtinet altos aut tribunalia structa manibus ad experirnenta altis- 
simi aastus, casis ita impositis, navigantibus similes, cum integant 
aquas circumdata, naufragis vero, cum recesserint : fugientesque 
cum mari pisces circa tuguria venantur. Non pecudem his habere, 
non lacte ali, ut finitimis, ne cum feris quidem dimicare contingit, 
omni procul abacto frutice. Ulva et palustri junco funes nectunt ad 
prostexenda piscibus retia : captumque manibus lutum ventis magis 
quam sole siccantes, terra cibos et rigentia septemtrione viscera sua 
urunt. Potus nonnisi ex imbre servato scrobibus in vestibulo 
domus. Et hae gentes, si vincantur hodie a populo Romano, servire 
se dicunt. Ita est profecto : multis fortuna parcit in poenam." — xvi. 1. 

The explanation of this difference in the way of testimony, lies in 
the likelihood of the Chauci of the lowest fen levels, exposed to 
malaria, exposed to inundations, and exposed to piracy, being a 
miserable race as compared with those of the higher and more inland 
country ; a view which reconciles both statements. But it also sup- 
plies a reason against carrying the Chauci too far inland. Probably, 
the Confederation was wider than the nation. 

In the more marshy parts of Eydersted, Ditmarsh, and Sleswick, 
the reclaimed lands, with their embankments, are called Koge. 
This is, possibly, the Chauc- in Chauci. If so, the Koge were the 
lands of the Hoc-ings, and Tacitus has given us the name of the 
country rather than of the people, the Germans that of the people 
rather than the land. This, again, is a reason against carrying the 
area of the Proper Chauci too far inland. 



XXXVI. In latere Chaucorum Chattorumque, Che- 
rusci 1 nimiam ac marcentem diu pacem illacessiti 
nutrierunt : idque jucundius, quam tutius fuit : quia 
inter impotentes et validos falso quiescas : ubi manu 
agitur, modestia ac probitas nomina superioris sunt. 



NOTES ON SECTION XXXVI. 129 

Ita qui olim " boni sequique Cherusci," nunc " inertes 
ac stulti" vocantur: Chattis victoribus fortuna in sa- 
pientiam cessit. Tracti ruina Cheruscorum et Fosi,'-' 
contermina gens, adversarum rerum ex aequo socii, 
cum in secundis minores fuissent. 

NOTES ON SECTION XXXVI. 

1 Cherusci.~\ — The first great fact in the history of the Cherusci is, 
that they were the confederates of Arminius, and the conquerors of 
Varus. 

The next is that they withstood the aggressions of their own 
countrymen as steadily as they did those of Rome. 

The Cherusci are mentioned by Caesar, and mentioned as the 
hereditary enemies of the Suevi. The Cherusci, too, it was who 
first checked the conquests and consolidations of Maroboduus. 

We may look upon the Cherusci * as the heads of a great confeder- 
ation, not only on the strength of their history, but on the evidence 
of ancient writers, e.g., Strabo, ol XrjpoiicjKoi km ol tovtwv vizi)kooi 
— Tacitus, " Cherusci, sociique eorum." 

If so, the import of the name may fluctuate, and sometimes mean 
a particular people, sometimes serve as a collective designation, in- 
cluding several such smaller divisions. This assumption eases many 
difficulties — perhaps, indeed, it is absolutely necessary. We hear so 
continually of great nations, like the Chatti, Cherusci, Sigambri and 
others, being conterminous, that, if we take the texts wherein such 
notices occur literally, we leave no room for several minor nations or 
tribes. 

Thus, in the present instance, there are special statements which 
bring the Cherusci — 

a. As far south as the Chatti. 

b. As far north as the Chauci. 

c. As far west as the Sicambri. 

What room does this leave for such populations as the Chamavi, 
Angrivarii, Fosi, &c. 1 Little, if any ; especially if we bring in 

* The full import of the Cheruscan resistance to Rome, the value of the 
patriotism of Arminius, and the extent to which the Cheruscan glory is as 
much English as German, are well developed in Professor Creasy's " The 
Fifteen Decisive Battles of the World," foremost amongst which he places 
the defeat of the legions of Varus. 

K 



130 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

other passages which connect the previous populations with each 
other — e.g., there is the statement of Tacitus, that the Chauci and 
Chatti joined — " donee in Chattos usque sinuetur." 

Considerations of this kind justify us in believing that, when cer- 
tain great nations are spoken of as acting a conspicuous part in 
history, certain minor ones may be included in the general name. 

Hence, I believe that when the Cherusci are spoken of in general 
history, the Chamavi and Angrivarii are included! in one of the two 
denominations ; and the words are used in a political sense. The 
ethnological, and narrower sense of the words, occurs only when the 
details of the geography or history require separation and speci- 
fication. 

The country of the Proper Cheruscans was bounded on the west 
by the Angri-varii ; for I suppose Engem, near Herford — the 
traditionary battle-field of the Arminian victory — to represent that 
name. 

To the south-west of the Angrivarii lay the Chamavi — Hamm 
being, again, supposed to retain their designation. 

On the north-east we may probably carry the Proper Cheruscans 
as far as the Hartz. For this, however, see Epilegomena, § Harudes. 

It is now time to inquire whether the Cherusci and their allies 
represented an ethnological section of the Germanic populations as 
they, certainly, did a political one. The answer to this is in the 
affirmative. Without committing ourselves to the doctrine that the 
Cheruscan league exactly coincided with the Cheruscan form of the 
German language, we may safely say that such was nearly the case. 
r If so, the Cherusci are of the same ethnological importance with the 
Frisians. 

Of the Saxon division of the German dialects as opposed to the 
Platt-Deutsch and High German, and of the Saxon nationalities as 
opposed to the Frank, Alemannic, and Gothic, Lombard and Bur- 
gundian, the Cherusci are the southern representatives. 

Of the Cherusci, in the wide sense of the term, the north and 
north-western members appear in the eighth century under the 
name of Old Saxons, this meaning the Saxons of the continent, or 
the mother-country, in opposition to the Saxons of England, or 
Anglo-Saxons. 

If the Cherusci of Tacitus and the earlier writers be the Saxons of 
Beda and later ones, how comes it that the one name never appears 
in the classical, and the other never in the German writers ? Cassar, 



NOTES ON SECTION XXXVI. 131 

Strabo, Velleius Paterculus, all speak of the Cherusci, and all say 
nothing about the Saxons. Ptolemy, as is well known, is the first 
writer who mentions them. On the other hand Claudian is the last 
writer in whom we find the word Cherusci. 

venit accola silvse 

Bructerus Hercynia?, latisque paludibus exit 
Cimber, et ingentes Albin liquere Cherusci. 

Consul, iv. Honor. 450. 

As long as we have the Cherusci there are no Saxons. As soon 
as we meet with the Saxons the Cherusci disappear. 

If we wish to cut the Gordian knot, we can have recourse to the 
assumption of migration and displacement — in which the Old Saxons 
cease to be the descendants of the Cherusci and their allies, and re- 
present a new and intrusive population as foreign to the old Che- 
ruscan country of Germany as they were to that of the Britons. 
There are certain texts that encourage this view, e.g., the present 
notice of the fallen state of the Cherusci and Fosi is in favour of their 
being easily displaced and superseded by some more flourishing im- 
migrants. 

Valeat quantum. It only does half the business. It only extin- 
guishes the Cherusci. The presence and preponderance of the 
Saxons it leaves unexplained. 

The full import of this must be admitted. 

a. The Saxons, which by assumption are supposed to replace the 
Cherusci, cannot be got from the country of the Chatti. The Chatti 
were High Germans. 

b. Nor yet from that of the Chauci. The majority of the Chauci 
were Frisians. 

c. Nor yet from that of the Lower Rhine. The language here 
was Platt-Deutsch. 

More than this — they could not have come from any small or in- 
considerable country at all, from none of the nooks or corners 
between the Great Frisian, Platt-Deutsch, High German, and Sla- 
vonic areas. The differences between the Anglo-Saxon and Old 
Saxon dialects, show that the common language was spoken over a 
large tract of ground, and that for a considerable length of time. 

The assumption of a Saxon immigration into the Cheruscan terri- 
tory, is not only gratuitous, but it engenders as many difficulties as 
it removes. 



132 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

In ordinary cases I should resort at once to the supposition that 
the two names belonged to different languages, and repeat the 
reasoning that applied to Chatti and Suevi. To do this, however, 
here, requires grave consideration : so good a case can be made out 
on both sides for the indigenous and native character of the name. 
Both Gkerusci and Saxo seem to be German words — one as German 
as the other. 

Reasons, however, against admitting loth to be German, and — 

Reasons for choosing the former instead of the latter, Cherusci 
rather than Saxones, will be found in the Epilegomena, §§ Saxons 
and Harudes. 

In the term Cherusci, in its wider sense, I include, as may partly 
be anticipated, the following populations : — 

1. The Angrivarii. 

2. The Chamavi. 

3. The Dulgibini. 

4. The Fosi. 

5. The Chasuarii. 

2 Fosi.] — Probably occupants of the banks of the river Fuse, or 
the parts about the town of Celle. 



XXXVII. Eumdem Germanise situm proximi Oce- 
ano Cimbri x tenent, parva nunc civitas, sed gloria 
ingens : veterisque famae late vestigia 2 manent, utraque 
ripa castra, ac spatia, quorum ambitu nunc quoque 
metiaris molem manusque gentis, et tam magni ex- 
ercitus fidem. Sexcentesimum et quadragesimum 
annum Urbs nostra agebat, cum primum Cimbrorum 
audita sunt arnia, Csecilio Metello ac Papirio Carbone 
consul ibus. Ex quo si ad alterum Imperatoris Tra- 
jani consulatum computemus, ducenti ferme et decern 
anni colliguntur : tamdiu Germania vincitur. Medio 
tam longi sevi spatio, multa invicem damna. Non 



NOTES ON SECTION XXXVII. 133 

Samnis, non Poeni, non Hispanic, Galliseve, ne Parthi 
quidem ssepius admonuere: quippe regno Arsacis 
acrior est Germanorum libertas. Quid enim aliud 
nobis, quam csedem Crassi, amisso et ipse Pacoro, 
infra Ventidium dejectus Oriens objecerit? At Ger- 
mani Carbone, et Cassio, et Scauro Aurelio, et Ser- 
vilio Csepione, Cn. quoque Manlio fusis vel captis, 
quinque simul consulares exercitus populo Romano, 
Varum, tresque cum eo legiones, etiam Csesari abs- 
tulerunt : nee impune C. Marius in Italia, divus Julius 
in Gallia, Drusus ac Nero et Germanicus in suis eos 
sedibus perculerunt. Mox ingentes C. Caesaris minse 
in ludibrium versa?. Inde otium, donee occasione 
discordise nostra; et civilium armorum, expugnatis 
legionum hibernis, etiam Gallias affectavere : ac rursus 
pulsi inde, proximis temporibus triumpliati magis 
quam victi sunt. 

NOTES ON SECTION XXXVII. 

1 Cimbri.] — A measure of the scantiness of satisfactory evidence 
as to the Cimbro-Teutonic war may be collected from Niebuhr. For 
the defeat of Cn. Papirius Carbo, near Noreia, in 113 B.C., he quotes 
Appian and the Epitome Liviana ; for their actions with M. Junius 
Silanus, and M. Aurelius Scaurus, he regrets that Livy is wanted, 
and that a writer so late as Zonaras, is his best authority. Floras, 
Eutropius, and Orosius supply the next best data. All, however, 
derive their materials from Livy — himself a writer one hundred and 
fifty years after the event. But we may go farther than this, and by 
turning to the life of Marius see the confusion into which Plutarch 
falls, and the speculation in which he indulges. 

Beyond this lies the consideration of the writers anterior to the 
time of Livy. Valerius Antias is especially quoted by Orosius ; and, 
of all writers, Valerius Antias is the least to be trusted. 

The most naked statements of facts is as follows : — 

A.D. 113. — The Cimbri defeat the consul Papirius Carbo, near 
Noreia in Styria. 

A.D. 109— 107.— The Cimbri, Tigurini, and Ambrones defeat 



134 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

M. Junius Silanus, L. Cassius Longinus, and M. Aurelius Scaurus, 
in Roman Gaul, at some place unknown. 

A.D. 105. — The same defeat Cn. Manlius and Q. Servilius 
Cospio. 

A.D. 102. — The Teutones are defeated by Marius near Aix in 
Provence. 

A.D. 101. — The Ciinbri, Tigurini, Arnbrones, and Teutones are 
defeated by Marius in the Tyrol. 

But, as the general character of an historical transaction may be 
known even where the details are forgotten, there are still points 
upon which the great writers of the close of the republic may be 
consulted. 

Now what did Ccesar consider their ethnological affinities to be ? 
Gallic. Sallust 1 Gallic. Velleius Paterculus 1 Gallic. It is only 
the later writers that carry their origin north of Gaul. 

But the Teutones are German at least. It is the same word as 
Deut-sch. The preliminaries to this question are to be found 
in not. in v. Germania. 

It is an undoubted fact that writers as early as Virgil, Lucan, 
Juvenal, and Martial, use the epithet Teutonicus : and when they 
do so they mean after the fashion of Teutons. 

But it is no undoubted fact that they mean thereby German. 
They mean of or belonging to the xvell-hiown enemy conquered by 
Marius, without defining the country of that enemy. 

It is also an undoubted fact that writers of the tenth century use 
the epithet Teutonicus as equivalent to German, i.e., as another form 
of Theotiscus. 

This, however, is after (and not before) the word Theotiscus has 
been used for Germanus. 

In other words, the epithet Teutonicus, although really a deriva- 
tive of Teutones, passes for another form of Tkeot-iscus, or as a 
derivative from Theot- or Diot-, and so becomes a name for the Ger- 
mans, simply because Theotisci had been a name for them before. 

But Theotisci was no name for the Germans until the tenth cen- 
tury, about one thousand years after the first use of the word 
Teuton. 

To take a measure of the magnitude of this paralogism, let 
us suppose an advocate for the Belgic origin of the Lowland 
Scotch, to argue in the following manner : — Belg- and vulg- 
are similar words ; therefore the Vulgar tongue, and the Belgic 



NOTES ON SECTION XXXVII. 135 

tongue are the same ; therefore the Belgce are Vulgares. This is 
no caricature. Mutatis mutandis, the argument alluded to runs — 
Teut-on and Dut-ch are similar words ; therefore the Dutch tongue 
and the Teutonic tongue are the same ; therefore the Teutones are 
Deutsche. 

The doctrine of the present writer concerning the ethnology of 
these two populations was laid before the Philological Society as far 
back as 1844 ; and the article in which it is exhibited, is re-printed 
at the end of the present volume, which supersedes the necessity of 
a long note. 

The chief addition that he would make to the quotations and 
references there found is the following extract from the Marmor 
Ancyranum : — " cimbeique et chaeudes et semnones et eiusdem 

TEACTUS ALII GEBMANOEUM POPULI PEE LEGATOS AMICITIAM MEAM ET 
POPULI EOMANI PETIEEUNT." 

This, combined with the fact of a country so far east as Styria, 
being the point whereon they fought their first battle, has suggested 
the possibility of their having been Gauls in the same way as the 
language of the Gothini was Gallic, i.e., not at all, but Slavonians 
instead ; a fact which would well account for the difficulty of 
definitely fixing them in any part of Gallia. 

Nay — they may be Germans. At any rate, if one of the two 
populations must be Gothic, the claim is the strongest for the 
Cimbri — so utterly worthless is the argument from the word Deut-sch. 
The Cimbri are, at least, near enough the Semnones to be their allies ; 
just as the Semnones were near enough the Germanic territory of 
Maroboduus to have belonged to his empire. 

2 Veteris famce — vestigia.~\ — The disbeliever of the existence of 
either Cimbri or Teutones in Germany, sees in this statement merely 
an inference. Certain monuments (perhaps Gravhoie, Ting-stene 
or other similar well-known antiquities of the so-called Cimbric 
Chersonese) required explanation. The Roman antiquaries (for it 
must be remarked that the text gives us no hint that this view was 
native) referred them to the populations in question. 



13G THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

XXXVIII. Nunc de Suevis 1 dicendum est, quorum 
non una, ut Chattorum Tencterorumve, gens : majorem 
enim Germanise partem obtinent, propriis adliuc na- 
tionibus nominibusque discreti, quamquam in com- 
mune Suevi vocentur. Insigne gentis obliquare cri- 
nem, nodoque substringere. Sic Suevi a ceteris 
Germanis: sic Suevorum ingenui a servis separantur. 
In aliis gentibus. seu cognatione aliqua Suevorum, 
seu (quod same accidit) imitatione, rarum et intra 
juventse spatium; apud Suevos, usque ad canitiem, 
horrentem capillum retro sequuntur, ac same in ipso 
solo vertice religant : principes et ornatiorem habent : 
ea cura formse, sed innoxisc. Neque enim ut anient 
amenturve ; in altitudinem quamdam et terrorem, 
adituri bella, compti, ut h ostium oculis, ornantur. 

NOTE ON SECTION XXXVIII. 

1 Szievis.~] — The preliminaries to this note, are the note (on the 
Chatti) and the xv. section of the Prolegomena. 

The Suevi of Tacitus lie east of those of Caesar, since they nowhere 
reach the Rhine ; in other words, the Suevi of Tacitus begin where 
those of Caesar ended. This follows from the separation of Suevi 
from the Chatti — a separation not made by Caesar. Tacitus requires 
two areas — one for ^the one population, the other for the other ; 
Caesar allows us to place both within the same. 

The Suevi of Tacitus extended from the eastern frontier of the 
Chatti as far as the Elbe, at least ; probably further. 

As far as the Suevi of Tacitus coincide with the Hermunduri and 
Chatti, they are German. Beyond this they are Slavonians. 

The term Suevicum mare, applied to a part of the Baltic, is re- 
ferable to a different origin than the Suevia=Suabia of south- 
western Germany. — Vid. not. in v. 

See also EjAlegomena, § Suevi. 



NOTE ON SECTION XXXIX. 137 

XXXIX. " Vetustissimos se nobilissimosque Sue- 
vorum" Semnones 1 memorant. Fides antiquitatis, re- 
ligione firmatur. Stato tempore in silvam, auguriis 
patrum et prisca formidine sacram, omnes ejusdem 
sanguinis populi legationibus coeunt, csesoque publice 
homine celebrant barbari ritus horrenda priniordia. 
Est et alia luco reverentia. Nemo nisi vinculo li- 
gatus ingreditur, ut minor, et potestatem numinis prse 
se ferens: si forte prolapsus est, attolli et insurgere 
haud licitum : per humum evolvuntur : eoque omnis 
superstitio respicit, tamquam inde initia gentis, ibi 
regnator omnium deus, cetera subjecta atque parentia. 
Adjicit auctoritatem fortuna Semnonum : centum 
pagis habitantur : magnoque corpore efficitur, ut se 
Suevorum caput credant. 

NOTE ON SECTION XXXIX. 

1 Semnones.] — Velleius Paterculus makes the Semnones conter- 
minous with the Hermunduri, from whom they are separated by the 
Elbe — "ad flumen Albim, qui Semnonum Hermundurorumque fines 
prseterfluit." — ii. 106. 

For reasons for believing the Albis of Paterculus to be the Saale, 
see p. 148. 

This gives their western limit. In the east Ptolemy carries them 
/xt'xpt tov %ovri£ov Trorafxov, and makes them conterminous with the 
Silingi on the south — •koXlv vtto fxsv tovq ^ejAvovag oikovgl %l- 
Xiyyai. 

Now Silingi=Silesia. 

If so the area of the Semnones was, as near as possible, the present 
country of Saxony : and of the Slavonians of that country, I believe 
them to have been the Slavonic ancestors. 

Strabo mentions the Semnones amongst the subjects of Marobo- 
duus — Kcu to TiiJv %ovij£idv aiirdiv fieya edvog ^efivajvag. 

At the beginning of the historical period of the populations 
between the Saale and Elbe, the chief nation is that of the Sorabi, a 



138 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

name which appears as Surabi, Suurbi, Siurbi, Surpe, Surfe, Surbi, 
Urbii, the country being Surabia and Suirbia. 

This name is native and Slavonic, as we learn from such forms as 
Zrib-in and Zirb-in ; the -n being the adjectival affix. 

It is a native name of great generality, since it represents the 
same root as the %wop- in the name %ir6poi, applied by Procopius 
to the south-eastern Slavonians, and the S-rv in Servia, the 2,ep€- 
in the ^ep€\oi of Constantine Porphyrogenita. 

The still-existing Slavonians of Upper Lusatia call themselves 
Srbje. 

But that they extended as far west as the Saale, is shown by the 
following extract, one out of many similar. " Sorabi Sclavi, qui 
cavipos inter Albim et Salam interjacentes incolunt, in fines Thurin- 
gorum et Saxonum, qui eis erant contermini, prrcdandi causa in- 
gressi." — Ann. Einh. ad an. 782, Pertz i. 163. 

The Surpe were known to Alfred. 

The Sorabian Slavonic language was spoken in Leipsic till 
a.d. 1327.— Schaffarik, p. 480. 

In geographical, or else in political continuity, with the Sorabian 
Slavonians were the Dahminci, the Siusli, the Milcieni (for the parts 
about Bautzen), the Lusici (of Lusatia), and to the south-east the 
descendants of the %i\iyyai of Ptolemy, in the century called Sleenz- 
ane, and in the present Schliesen=Silesians. 

Such seem to have been the descendants of the Semnones and the 
more eastern Suevi of Tacitus. 



XL. Contra Langobardos 1 paucitas nobilitat : plu- 
rimis ac valentissimis nationibus cincti, non per obse- 
quium, sed proeliis et periclitando tuti sunt. Reu- 
digni 2 deinde, et Aviones, 3 et Angli, 4 et Varini, 5 et 
Eudoses, 6 et Suardones, 7 et Nuithones, 8 fluminibus aut 
silvis muniuntur : nee quidquam notabile in singulis, 
nisi quod in commune Hertlium, 9 id est, Terram ma- 
trem colunt, eamque intervenire rebus hominum, in- 
vehi populis, arbitrantur. Est in insula 10 Oceani " ca- 



NOTES ON SECTION XL. 139 

stum nemus, dicatum in eo vehiculum, veste contectum, 
attingere uni sacerdoti concession. Is adesse pene- 
trali deam intelligit, vectamque bobus feminis multa 
cum veneratione prosequitur. Lseti tunc dies, festa 
loca, qusecumque adventu hospitioque dignatur. Non 
bella ineunt, non arma sumunt, clausum omne fer- 
rum ; pax et quies tunc tantum nota, tunc tantum 
amata, donee idem sacerdos satiatam conversatione 
mortalium deam templo reddat : mox vehiculum et 
vestes, et, si credere velis, numen ipsum secret© lacu 
abluitur. Servi ministrant, quos statim idem lacus 
haurit. Arcanus hinc terror, sanctaque ignorantia, 
quid sit id, quod tantum perituri vident. 

NOTES ON SECTION XL. 

1 Langobardos.] — " Longobardos vulgo ferunt nominatos a prolixa, 
barbd et nunquam tonsa." — Isidor. Hispal. Origg. ix. 2. "Certum 
est, Longobardos ab intactse ferro barbce longitudine, cum primitus 
Winili dicti fuerint, ita postmodum appellatos ; nam juxta illorum 
linguam lang longam hart barbam significat." — Paul. Diacon. i. 9 . 

This is tbe etymology which was first received, and which is, per- 
haps, most generally credited. I do not know who first suggested 
the idea that the -bard in Lango-5ard was the bart ' in hal-bert and 
par^-izan, the name of warlike weapons ; but in such a case, the 
Langobardi are not the Long-beards but the Halberdiers. 

In the choice between these etymologies, it must be remembered, 
that of the two, the former was particularly likely to mislead a 
writer in the Latin language, on account of the similarity between 
the Latin barba and the German bart. 

Again, it must be remembered that, in Beowulf and the Traveller's 
Song, we meet with the compound HeaJ?o-beardan ; hedpo- being a 
prefix adapted to a warlike weapon, but not to a beard. 

The habit of the Chatti crinem barbamque summittere (see § xxxi.), 
has been quoted in favour of translating bart by beard. In my 
mind, it goes the other way : since, if the habit of letting the beard 
grow were common amongst so large a population as the Chatti, 
the Lombard habit would have been the rule rather than the excep- 



140 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

tion, and, as such, have failed in attracting notice, or developing a 
name. 

Ptolemy's notice of the populations whose name end in -bard 
(and in Ptolemy there are two such) introduces a difficulty. 

He first places Langobardi (Aay yotdpcoC) west and south of the 
Anglian Suevi (2ov?/£ot ol \Ayyei\ot), these latter being on the 
Middle Elbe. 

Afterwards he places AaKKotdploi between the Chauci Majores 
and the Suevi ; conterminous with the Angrivarii and Dulgubini 

(AuvXyov pvwi). 

This complication may, possibly, appear unimportant ; so that 
the inquirer may, perhaps, think himself justified in disposing of it 
at once by assuming either an error in the reading, or an oversight 
in the author. Possibly, this view is right. Nevertheless, it is by no 
means necessarily so. The word in question is a compound, of which 
the qualifying element comes first. Hence, it is far from impossible 
that whilst Langobai di means men with bards (beards or halberts, as 
the case may be) of one sort, Ldkkobardi may mean men with bards 
(beards, &c.) of another. True it is that the elements Lang- and 
Lakh- are suspiciously alike ; neither can any satisfactory meaning be 
given to the latter word. Nevertheless, the inference of their being 
the same word is far from conclusive. Compound words may be 
alike and yet different ; as are Wessex and Essex. 

Zeuss gives a full, perhaps an excessive, import to this difference, 
considering that the Lakkobardi were not only the subsequent con- 
querors of Italy under Alboin (which the Langobardi were not) 
but that Ptolemy knowingly and intentionally distinguished between 
the two — " Diese %ovT]£oi konnen also nicht mit den Langobarden, 
den Eroberern Italiens, verwechselt werden ; Ptolemaeus selbst, 
scheint es, will sie unterschieden wissen, dass er diese, die schon in 
getrennten Sitzen aufgestellt sind, obwohl ihr name derselbe ist, 
auch verschieden AaKKoSdploi benennt." — p. 95. 

Again — " Mit den 'Sovrjgoi Aayyotdphoi des Ptolemseus diirfen 
nicht verwechselt werden seine AaKKotdpEoi, &c." — p. 109. 

It is doubtful, however, whether Ptolemy's own text requires this 
distinction to be thus stringently insisted on, i.e., if we take the 
Angri-varii to be the centre for our inquiries, and admit Engern to 
represent their locality. — See § xxxiii. 

Thus — a. The Suevi Langobardi are conterminous with the 
Bructeri Minores (BowdKrepoi ol ym-poi) and the Sigambri. Of 



NOTES ON SECTION XL. 141 

these, they lie to the soiith, and a very little extension westwards 
will carry their frontier up to that of the Angri-varii. 

b. Now it is the Angrivarii which the AaKKo€apcoi succeed : the 
Angrivarian area being the only one which separates the two 
Langobards. 

Still both the interruption and the difference of form must be 
taken as they are found ; and explained rather than denied. 

In Staffordshire, and many other parts of England, syllables 
ending in -ing, are pronounced ingk. Suppose this to have been the 
case with some dialect in Germany, from which the notice of a 
people called Langobardan was derived. The sound would then be 
Langk-o-bardan. To a Greek no way of spelling this would be more 
natural than by -kk- ; since it was by -yy- that he already spelt the 
sound of -rig. 

The Langobardi of Velleius are essentially those of Ptolemy, 
i.e., Northern Germans — " Receptee Chaucorum nationes . . . fracti 
Langobardi, gens etiam Germana feritate ferocior ; denique . . . 
usque ad flumen Albim. Romanus cum signis perductus exercitus." 
— ii. 106. 

So are those of Tacitus — although they follow the Suevi in the 
order of description, they are connected with the undoubtedly 
northern Angli, &c. 

It is safe, then, to say that the Langobard area was either discon- 
tinuous and interrupted, or else exceedingly sinuous and irregular in 
outline. 

It is not so easy to account for this. 

a. If it were certain that b-rd=beard ; and — 

6. If it were also certain that the length of beard was a charac- 
teristic of the Chatti, it would be fair to consider them as an intrusive, 
conquering, immigrant portion of that people — i.e., High Germans 
within the Saxon area. 

But as neither of these points is certain, the relations of the 
Langobards are uncertain also. 

They may either be intrusive ax fragmentary. 

a. Intrusive. — If they be this, the population from which they 
originated may be either the High Germanic Chatti, or the Low 
German Sicambri. 

b. Fragmentary. — If this, they may represent Saxons whose area 
has been encroached on. 

They may be many other things besides. 



142 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

The evidence of Tacitus makes them a small nation. Now there 
is the shade of an objection to this. Helmoldus (i. 2G) mentions the 
Bardi ; whilst in the neighbourhood of Liineburg, so far north and 
east as even the Elbe, there is a district called Barden-gowe, and a 
town called Barden-wik. 

Account for the element Bard- by supposing the Lango-Jarc/s to 
have given the name, and the nation becomes a large one ; so large 
as to reach from Engern to Liineburg. Good writers — perhaps the 
best — have done this. Yet the termination -bard alone, minus the 
prefix, scarcely seems to warrant the inference. 

Far more important is the question as to the relation which the 
Langobards who concpaered Italy, and gave their name to Lombardy, 
bore to these northern Langobards — the neighbours of the Angri- 
varii and Angli, but this is the subject of a separate notice.* 

2 Reudigni.~\ — See note in v. Nuithones. The same error which 
Tacitus is supposed to have made with the Nuithones, he is supposed 
to make with the Rexidigni. He mistakes the first letter of their 
names. Reudigni, according to Zeuss, is for Teut-igni, or Teidingi. 
But these Teutings are not exactly the Teut-ones, but the Teutonarii ; 
mentioned by Ptolemy as a different tribe — Mera^v %alovwv le. Kal 
twv 2ou//6W TtvTovodpoi Kal Ovipovvoi, <Papodeivu)V Ce kcu %ovr)£wv, 
Ilevtovec, kou Avapiroi. 

Of the three assumptions here, the last two are legitimate. 

That the combination -igni is the patronymic or gentile form -ing, 
so that Reudig7ii=Reudingi=th.e Reudings, is highly probable. 

That the patronymic form in -ing, can take the place of the ter- 
mination -iv&re is shown by the forms Ke?it-ing-as=men of Kent, as 
compared with C ant-war e=-inhabitants of Kent. 

But the likelihood of Tacitus, who has hitherto given all his 
names in an unexceptionable form, blundering, when he begins to 
blunder, in two names out of six, is, to say the least, doubtful. 

3 Aviones.] — These are considered to be the cutters; their name 
being derived from the verb hauan. By the exact term Aviones 
they are not mentioned elsewhere. Ptolemy, however, has as one of 
the tribes of the Cimbric Chersonesus the Ko£av<W. This name is 
identified with Aviones by two processes : — 

1. ~Ko€avc>-, is the participle of the verb hauan. 

* See Epilegomena, § Langobards of Lombardy. 



NOTES ON SECTION XL. 143 

2. The KoGavtioL of Ptolemy=the Xaugoi of Strabo=the Aviones 
of Tacitus. 

This, the identification of the Aviones with Ko€avloi — not the 
derivation from hauan — is probable ; the more so as one of the 
Greek forms of Chamavi is XafxaSol. 

See Epilegomena, § Obii. 

4 Angli.]— See Epilegomena, §§ on the Saxons, on the Angli, and 
on the Angli of Tlmringia. 

5 Varini.'] — The probable locality of the Varini is the parts about 
Grabow and Warnow, on the river Eldene, an eastern feeder of the 
Elbe, and the course of the river Warnow. 

This notice of the geographical relations of the Varini is impor- 
tant ; since they supply some of our scanty data for the position of 
the Angle area, anterior to the respective migration of that impor- 
tant family. 

The proposed locality assumes that the Varini of Tacitus occupied 
the same country as the Wamabi, Warnavi, or Warnahi of Adam 
of Bremen and certain writers of the twelfth century. A Mecklen- 
burg charter of a.d. 1185, contains the following passage :~"Silva, 
quse distinguit terras Havelliere, scilicet et Muritz, eandem terram 
quoque Muritz et Vepero cum terminis suis ad terram Warnowe 
ex utraque parte fluminis quod Eldene dicitur usque ad castrum 
Grabow." 

Again, in a charter a.d. 1189: — "Distinguit tandem terram 
Moritz et Veprouwe cum omnibus terminis suis ad terram quae 
Wamoioe vocatur, includens et terram Warnouwwe cum terminis suis 
ex utraque parte fluminis quod Eldena dicitur, usque ad castrum 
quod Grabow nuncupatur ." 

This is the first mention we have of the Varini of Mecklenburg in 
the middle ages. For the semi- classical times, we have notices of 
Warni in Jornandes and Procopius. 

But whether these Warni be the same as the Varini, is considered 
in Epilegomena, § Varni. 

Were the Varini of Tacitus Germanic or Slavonic 1 The follow- 
ing facts are in favour of their being Germanic : — 

1 . The evidence of Tacitus. 

2. Their worship (if real) of the same goddess as the Angli* 
worshipped. 

* See Epilegomena, § Angli. 



144 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

In favour of a Slavonic affinity are : — 

1. Their Slavonic character at the time they were first described 
from personal knowledge. 

2. The absence of any traces of a previous Germanic population in 
the area occupied by them. 

In other words, it is a certain fact that in the twelfth century 
the Warnavi were Slavonic, whilst the belief that the Varini were 
German, is a reasonable, but not unexceptionable, inference. 

Probably, they were a frontier population. 

6 Eudoses.] — One of the tribes of the Cimbric Chersonese in 
Ptolemy's list, is that of the <&oi/v£ouo-io£. Here Ptolemy is wrong and 
Tacitus right. Eudoses is the same word as bowdovaioi, minus 
the <& and v. Such is Zeuss's view. To justify the first changes he 
quotes the similar (supposed) mistake, on the part of Ptolemy, in the 
word <&ap6()eivoi. See note on Suardones. 

The second is defended — and that reasonably — by the forms 
Bouktouvtcu, Bpivl-avrai, Kivriov opog, and Haivoxalfxai j in all of 
which the v is, undoubtedly, an improper interfix. 

See Epilegomena, § Phundusii. 

7 Suardones.] — See note on Eudoses. 

This word is considered by Zeuss to be derived from the Mceso- 
Gothic svaird, Anglo-Saxon sweord=sword, just as Saxon from sahs 
=hi/fe. Hence, Tacitus's name is the correct one. On the other hand 
Ptolemy places after the Saxons, and on the river Chalusus (fxerd Se 
royf 2a'£ora.£ diro rov XaXovaov iroTajxov) the Pharodini {^apoceivoi). 

Now the Qapoh- of Qapodsiyot, is, according to Zeuss, the Suard- 
of Suardones. I am not prepared either to deny or affirm this. 

8 Nuithones.] —Zeuss's reasoning ^upon this word is remarkable, 
but unsatisfactory. By an elaborate series of combinations he derives 
his own name from it. He assumes : — 

1. That by the Nuithones Tacitus means the Teutones, the t being 
changed into n. " Aus Deutschland selbst geben Plinius und Ptole- 
mseus noch die formen Teutoni, Teutones, aber auch schon Tacitus 
Nuithones (=Niuthones) mit den wurzelhaftem n, wie Nerthus." 

2. That Cluuari, * a remarkable, and hitherto unexplained, form 
in a document called the Wessobrunner Manuscript, is the same as 

* See Epilegomena, § Ciuuari. 



NOTES ON SECTION XL. 145 

Z invar i ; of which the second element is the word ware=inhabitants, 
and the first the root Teut-, with the first t changed, and the latter 
ejected. Of these three changes it is only the second that is, etymo- 
logically, objectionable. The decomposition of the word into -ware 
+ a prefixed noun is almost certainly correct. The change from t to 
z is nothing more than what the difference between a High German 
and Low German form leads us to expect. The ejection of the 
second t, and the connection thereby effected with the root Teut- is 
illegitimate. 

3. That the Old High German proper names Zuto, Zuzo y 
and Zuzzo and the Frisian form Tuta are the same as Teut- in 
Teuton. 

4. That Zuzzo =Zuzo=Zuto=Tuta= Teut- in Teuton=Nuith- in 
Nuithones=Zeuss : — " Und dann ist auch der familienname Zeuss in 
neuer form der alte name V When a man is investigating the etymo- 
logy of his own name we must allow him more than usual latitude. 

9 Rerthum.] — Another reading is Nerthum, and that in good MSS. 

Nevertheless, the probability of a form in h being preferable is so 
great, as, perhaps, to justify us in assuming it to be the right one. 

The words Terram matrem, when compared with our own word 
earth, the Anglo-Saxon eorpe, the Old High German erdu, the Mo3so- 
Gothic airthus almost force upon us the reading Herthum. 

As cautions, however, against disposing of the N thus summarily, 
we have the following facts : — 

1. The fact of there being no H in any of the German equivalents 
to Terra. 

2. The fact of there being in the Eddaic mythology a deity named 
Niordr. 

And against the conclusion that, even if the reading be h, the 
goddess must necessarily be Hertha— Earth, is the existence of an 
Anglo-Saxon deity Hre\e, with different attributes. 

Still I think Terra Mater = Mother Earth. 

10 Insula] — Heligoland. 

11 Oceani.] — The German Ocean. The name IIelig~o-=holy isle 
favours this view. 

The term Oceani does the same. Nevertheless, it is applied to 
the Baltic also. 

L 



14G THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

So does the undoubted Germanic occupancy of the island. 

So do its relations to the Elbe and Weser. 

At the same time claims have been asserted for the Isle of Ilugen 
in the Baltic. 

Rug-en is full of sacred antiquities ; and, at the beginning of the 
historical period, was, perhaps, more unequivocally a Holy Island 
than Heligoland, in fact, though not in name. 

But at the beginning of the historical period, the rites, creed, and 
population were Slavonic. 

Of course, by considering the Rugii of § 43 as Germanic, this 
objection is neutralized. 

But I more than doubt whether this can be done. 

As to the Eeudigni, Aviones, Angli, Varini, Eudoses, Suardones, 
and Kuithones, collectively, we must remember, that, at the beginning 
of the historical period, the Slavonians of the Lower Elbe are found 
so far westwards as to make it doubtful whether the German frontier 
— the Northern Germano-Slavonic March — can be carried much 
farther eastward than the Hartz. 

Lauenburg, was the occupancy of the Polabi, a remarkable name. 
Po=on and Laba=Albis= the Elbe, the Slavonic form of that 
name. Hence the Polabi were to the Elbe as the Po-mo-rani of 
Pomerania to the sea (po=on, and more=sea). Slavonic as this 
form was, it was adopted by the Germans ; and became a hybrid 
word by means of the affix -ing — Po-lab-m^, a word half German 
and half Slavonic in form, but wholly Slavonic in power. 

Eastern Holstein was Wagrian; Aldenburg being the capital of the 
Slavonic Wagri. — " Henricus . . intravit Slaviam, percussit . . omnem 
terram Plunensem, Luthilenburgensem, A Idenburgensem, omnemque 
regionem, quce inchoat a rivo Sualen et clauditur mari Baltico et flu- 
mine Trabena." — Helmold. i. 56. 

Mecklenburg was the country of the Obotriti ; Luneburg of the 
Linones, whose Slavonic tongue was extant till a.d. 1700. The 
details of the Slavonians of Alt-mark are obscure, but as it is certain 
that Luchow and Danneberg in the north were Slavonic, and that 
southwards there were numerous Slavonians in the direction of 
Saxony, we may, provisionally, consider that a line drawn from 
Hamburg to Jena represents the Old Slavono-Germanic March, 
in its oldest form. Afterwards, the Saale forms the boundary. 

That the Varini were Slavonic is only likely. That the Angli were 
German is certain. Hence — 



NOTES ON SECTION XL. 147 

The Eudoses, &c, come in with the latter rather than the former, 
and, on the ground of being what the Angli were, are Germanic. 

Such being the case, it is necessary to place their locality in the 
direction of Holstein and Sleswick northwards rather than in that of 
Luneburg and Mecklenburg to the north-east; since the former is 
the direction of the German, the latter that of the Slavonic popu- 
lations. 

It is also necessary to place them on the North Sea rather than 
the Baltic, on account of Heligoland. 

Hence, the majority of the tribes in question were probably the 
ancient occupants of the western parts (the eastern being Slavonic) 
of Sleswick-Holstein ; a population divided between the Anglo- 
Saxon and the North-Frisian sections, and a population more or 
less represented by the Nordalbingians of the eighth century. 

Saxonum populus quidam, quos claudit ab austro 
Albia sejunctim positos aquilonis ad axem. 

Poeta Saxo, ad an. 798. 

" Est enim gens in partibus nostri regni Saxonum scilicet et 
Fresonum commixta, in confinibus Nordmannorum et Obodritorum 
sita." — Ruodolfi Fuldens. Transl. S. Alexandri, Pertz ii. 677. 

In the way of a more minute geography, these Nordalbingians 
were the people of Sturmar, Holstein, and Ditmarsh. — " Thiedmarsi, 
Holtsati, Sturmarii : transalbianorum Saxonum tres sunt populi : 
primi ad Oceanum Thiatmarsgoi (al. Thiedmarsi), et eorum ecclesia 
Mildinthorp (al. Melindorp) ; secundi Holtzati, dicti a silvis, quas 
incolunt, eos Sturia flumen interfluit, quorum ecclesia Sconenfeld ; 
tertii, qui et nobiliores, Sturmarii dicuntur, eo quod seditionibus ilia 
gens frequenter agitur. Inter quos metropolis Hammaburg caput 
extollit." — Adam. Brern. Hist. Eccl. c. 61. " Habet utique Hammen- 
burgensis ecclesia prsescriptos terminos suas parochise, ultimam 
scilicet partem Saxonise, quae est trans Albiam et dicitur Nordal- 
bingia, continens tres populos, Tethmarsos, Holsatos, Stormarios" — 
Helmold. Chron. Slavor. i. 6. "Attritse sunt vires Saxonum, et servie- 
runt Cruconi sub tributo, omnis terra videlicet Nordalbingorum, 
quas disterminatur in tres populos : Holzatos, Sturmarios, Thet- 
marchos." — Id. i. 26. 

The river Bille divided these from the Slavonians of Lauenburg. 

As Nordalbingi is a term denoting an attribute [i.e., geogra- 
phical position) ; and Sturmar, Ditmarsh, and Holstein geographical 

l 2 



148 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

terms, there is no difficulty in supposing that some of the names 
of the present text represent the ancestors of the -4??r//o-Saxons 
of Britain ; in other words, that they stood in the same relation 
to that section oi the Germanic population as the Fosi and other 
minor nations grouped around the'Cherusci, did to the Old Saxons. 

Still the distribution of the North Frisians complicates the view. 

See Epilegomena, § Angli. 



XLI. Et ha?c quidem pars Suevorum in secretiora 
Germanise porrigitur. Propior (nt quo modo paullo 
ante Rhenum, sic nunc Danubium sequar) Hermun- 
durorum civitas, 1 fida Romanis, eoque solis Germa- 
norum non in ripa commercium, sed penitus, atque 
in splendidissima Rhsetise provincice colonia : passim 
et sine custode transeunt; et cum ceteris gentibus 
arma modo castraque nostra ostendamus, his domos, 
villasque patefecimus, non concupiscentibus. In Her- 
munduris Albis oritur, 2 flumen inclitum et notum 
olim ; nunc tantum auditur. 

NOTES ON SECTION XLI. 

1 Hermundurorum civitas.'] — See pp. 66 and 149. 

2 In Hermunduris Albis oritur.] — Let us consider what means the 
contemporaries of Tacitus had of knowing the source of the true Elbe ; 
lying as they do within the unknown country of Bohemia. I say 
unknown because there were certainly few means of knowing it. In- 
deed, even at present it is by no means easy to say which of three 
rivers is the true Elbe — the river which runs by Pilsen on the west, 
the river which runs by Colin on the east, or the Muldau from the 
south : besides which, it is equally difficult to say which of the 
numerous feeders of these streams leads us to the true source. 

This makes it probable that the Albis to which Tacitus assigns 
the country of the Hermunduri was the Saale ; a view which gives 
us the parts about Hof as portions of the area of the Hermunduri. 



NOTES ON SECTION XLII. 149 

An additional reason for believing that, in the eyes of a German, 
the source of the Saale was the source of the Elbe, is to be found in 
the name of the latter river itself. The name Elv=river ; the 
Scandinavian equivalent to the German Fluss— a fact which shows 
either that the Frisian of the Lower Elbe was spoken in a form 
approaching the Norse, or else that the Norse itself was then spoken 
farther southwards than afterwards — " Albis fluvius oritur in prse- 
dictis Alpibus, perque medios Gothorum populos currit in Oceanum, 
inde et Goihelba dicitur." — De Sit. Danise, c. 229. This applies to 
the Swedish river Golaelf. 

Now as the name was German, and as it was given by the popu- 
lation of the lower part of the river, it is more likely that it was 
extended upwards to a German branch, like the Saale, than to a 
Slavonic one, like that which rises in Bohemia. 

As Tacitus is now beginning with the Danube, up to which he 
brings the Hermunduri, the source of the Elbe must be in the more 
northern parts of the area of that population ; but as he also sepa- 
rates the Hermunduri from the Suevi, we must be careful against 
carrying the frontier too far in that direction. 



XLII. JuxtaHermunduros 1 Narisci, 2 ac deinde Mar- 
comanni 3 et Quadi 4 agunt. Prsecipua Marcomannorum 
gloria viresque, atque ipsa etiam sedes, pulsis olim 
Boiis, virtute parta. Nee Narisci Quadive degene- 
rant. Eaque Germanise velut irons est, quatenus 
Danubio pergitur. Marcomannis, Quadisque usque ad 
nostram memoriam reges raanserunt, ex gente ipso- 
rum, nobile Marobodui et Tudri genus : jam et ex- 
ternos patiuntur. Sed vis et potentia regibus, ex 
auctoritate Romana : rar6 armis nostris, ssepius pe- 
cunia juvantur. 



NOTES ON SECTION XLII. 



1 Hermunduros.~\ — The reasons for considering the name Hermun- 
duri a compound word, are numerous and satisfactory. 



150 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

For the opinions as to the meaning of the term Hainan, 
see pp. 47 —49. 

The root dur- re-appears in the Tfup-io-xaljuai of Ptolemy ; a 
compound of Teur- and heim=hovie ; just as JBoio-hemum=the home 
of the Boil. All this is pointed out by Zeuss, who expressly says 
that Hermun-duri is evidently a compound (a/ugenscheinlick compo- 
sitwn) and also that the Teupioxal/ucu of Ptolemy means the same 
people. 

The identification of both forms with the modern form Thuringen 
(Thur-ingioi), is equally probable. The -ing is the gentile or patro- 
nymic affix — consequently no part of the original word. 

The change from d to t, which occurs between Tacitus and Ptolemy, 
occurs in the more modern forms also ; Durinc,= r £ur-ing, being the 
Old High German word. 

This justifies us in considering the population, whose name appears 
as the second element of the word Hermun-duri, as the occupants of 
the parts between the Werra and the Saale ; or the present district 
of Thuringia, wherein we find a Tor-gau. 

All this is confirmed by the following observations of Zeuss. 
After the Marcomannic war, in which they took part, the Hermun- 
duri disappear. Suevia, which, in the Roman maps, fills up the 
country between the Bructeri and Alemanni, in its eastern parts, 
represents their country. Jornandes, who mentions them but once, 
does so in a loose and general way, and evidently on the authority 
of older writers. Speaking of the Vandals of the first half of the 
fourth century, he says — " Erant namque illis tunc ab oriente Gothi, 
ab occidente Marcomanni, a septentrione Hermunduri, a meridie 
Hister, qui et Danubius dicitur." — C. 22. From this time forwards, 
history knows no Hermunduri, but, from the fifth century down- 
wards, Toringi, Thoringi, and Thuringi, in their stead. That the 
Thuringians are in nowise a different people from the early Hermun- 
duri, can be safely admitted, since we discover neither how so con- 
siderable a population as the latter, should have been lost, nor 
whence such a one as the former could have originated. Besides 
which, the later writers always place the Thuringians at the back 
of the Franks and Alemanni, and between them and the Saxons ; 
this being the original country of the Hermun-duri. 

Upon the locality of the Hermundorum civitas, I can throw no light. 

The extent given in the text to the area of the Hermunduri 
requires notice. Tacitus brings them as far south as the Danube. 



NOTES ON SECTION XLII. 151 

This is much beyond the limits of the present Thuringia. More 
than this, it is beyond the Tevpioyaijiai of Ptolemy. Nevertheless, 
for reasons given in the Epilegomena, I think the extension highly 
probable. 

If so, the country of the Hermun- duri was the greater part of 
Thuringia, plus the valley of the Naab. 

The complement to this note are Epilegomena, § Ostrogoths, and 
the next note. 

2 JVarisci.] — The Fichtelgebirge, in its western extension, is the 
water-shed to the Saale and the Naab — north and south; the Saale 
belonging to the system of the Elbe, the Naab to that of the Danube. 
Along with the valley of the Naab, that of the Regen should be con- 
sidered ; the Regen being the stream nearest the mountain-frontier of 
Bohemia. 

The present names of the geographical localities for the system of 
these two rivers, are almost wholly German — almost, but not quite. 
Slavonic forms appear occasionally, increasing slightly as we approach 
Bohemia. 

The German dialect, to which the German names of geographical 
localities (as far as it is not an over-refinement to refer them to one 
dialect more than another) are mostly referable, is the High German 
of Bavaria. 

Slavonic names occur even west of the Naab ; though rarely. 

Putting all this together, I infer — 

a. Prom the existence of Slavonic names at all, an early Slavonic 
occupancy. 

b. From the paucity of them, an early displacement of such 
occupants. 

c. From the forms in p, the Alemannic origin of the last invaders. 
Mark the word last. 

For accomplishing the change from Slavonic to German, the date 
of the chief Alemannic conquests is full early enough. 

But it by no means follows that, because Germans of the Alemannic 
type conquered a country, originally Slavonic, in the third, fourth, or 
fifth centuries, they must have been the first Germans who did so. 
Earlier encroachers upon the Slavonians of the Naab and Regen may 
have proceeded from the parts to the north — from Thuringia. A 
Plermunduric conquest in the first, is perfectly compatible with an 
Alemannic in the fifth century. 



152 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

I believe such to have been the case. The previous occupancy of 
the valley of the Naab (at least) by Germans anterior to the invasion 
of the present Bavarians, is necessary to account for their presence 
on the Danube, in the second, third, and fourth centuries : besides 
■which the present text requires it. 

The present text also requires that they should be either Hermun- 
duri, or closely allied to them. 

The reasons for believing the Hermunduri to have belonged to a 
different section of the Germans (indeed to have been the chief 
branch of the Moeso-Goths) will be found in the sequel.* 

Whether the Narisci were Slavonians like their neighbours on the 
east, or Germans like their neighbours on the south, is, notwith- 
standing the text, an open question. 

As Narisd, we have no further specific ethnological information 
about them. 

If, however, we allow the Ovapioroi of Ptolemy to be the same 
people, we get a second notice of them ; a notice, however, which 
adds nothing to our knowledge ; merely doing what is done by 
Tacitus, i.e., placing them next to the Hermunduri (Tevpioxctlfxai). 

To get any new facts, we must go further still. Let the word 
War<zsci=OvapiaToi=Warisci. 

For the French districts of Jura and Doubs, on the banks of 
the river from which the latter takes its name, we have the following 
notice : — " Eustasius ad Luxovium regressus est. Deinde ad Wa- 
rascos, qui partem Sequanorum provincise et Duvii amnis fluenta ex 
utraque ripa incolunt, pergit." — Vita S. Salabergce. 

This speaks only to the people. The following, however, goes 
further, and gives us the hypothesis as to their origin : — " Pergit 
(*c. Eustasius) progrediens Warescos ad fidem Domini nostri Jesu 
Christi convertit, qui olim de pago, qui dicitur Stadevanga, qui 
situs est circa Eegnum flumen, partibus Orientis fuerant ejecti, 
quique contra Burgundiones pugnam inierunt, sed a primo certamine 
terga vertentes, dehinc advenerunt, atque in pugnam reversi, victores 
quoque efi'ecti, in eodem pago Warescorum consederunt." — Vita S. 
Ermenfredi. 

There is nothing improbable in this ; the river Regnurn being 
considered the Regen. I have not, however, been more successful than 
Zeuss in finding such a name as Stadevanga on any of the maps. 

* Epilegomena, § Ostrogoths. 



NOTES ON SECTION XLII. 153 

The nearest approach to it is a compound of -vang on the Bavarian 
and Wurtemburg frontier. 

A shade of evidence in favour of the original Narisci having been 
Slavonic, is to be got from the confusion between the form in -sc- 
and that in -st- ; the identity being granted. 

A Sclavonic affinity would best account for this ; since, such a 
form might end in -ritsh (Nariish), a syllable which contains both 
the t out of which -st-, and the sh out of which sc- might be deve- 
loped. Nay ! such an ending as even -ishtsh would be nothing 
unusual in Slavonic. No German form exists which gives us an 
equally probable origin of the two forms. In that language it would 
be either -isk to the exclusion of the sound of t, or ist to the exclusion 
of that of h ; neither of which would be sufficiently strange to a 
Koman or Greek ear to be mistaken for the other, or, indeed, for 
anything else. Very different, however, would be the case with the 
complex Slavonic sibilants. 

A sound like the ch in chest (tsh), was a strange sound to the 
countrymen both of Tacitus and Ptolemy ; and (more than this) it 
was just the sound which one writer might represent by -sh, and 
another by -st. 

Their position as colonists in Burgundy is compatible with either 
affinity : though, perhaps, it favours the German, 

Dion's notice of the Naristw is — Kou ol Hapiaral raXanrcoprjirdyrec 
Tpto"%(\ioi cifia r]VTOju6\t]aav, Kal yfjv iv ry fifAirepq eXatov. — Lib. 
lxxi. 

As rrj i]p:eTEpa may apply to any portion of Roman Gaul, this 
passage may give us the origin of the Warasci. 

Again — as a mere guess, I suggest the probability of their repre- 
senting some of those intrusive members of the kingdom of Ariovistus 
who appropriated a third of the land of the Sequani, as related by 
Caesar. 

3 Marcornanni.] — The remarks of Prol. xvii. are the necessary 
preliminaries to this note : indeed, to a certain extent they stand in 
place of it. 

The Marc-o-manni in question were those of the Tshekh or Bohe- 
mian March, and, I imagine, they extended from the valley of the 
Naab to Lower Austria ; their area following the line of the moun- 
tains that enclose the south, and south-west parts of Bohemia. To 
the foot of these the Marc-o-manni were probably limited ; since, 



154 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

the mountain -fastnesses themselves were probably the residence of 
Slavonians. 

I do not imagine that there was a second March in this quarter, 
Le., one on the Roman (Rlnetian, Vindelician, or Rhrcto-Vindelician) 
frontier. The Danube served instead. 

Of course all this has the value of presumptive reasoning — no more. 

* Quadi.] — The area of the Quadi seems nearly to have reached 
as far south as the present province of Lower Austria. This brings 
them to the Danube, as the text of Tacitus requires — " Eaque 
Germanice velut frons est, quatenus Danubio pert/ it ur." At the same 
time, the line of the Germanic March must have been irregular, and 
the Germanic area north of the Danube narrow. It must also 
have extended as far northwards as Moravia and Upper Hungary. 

Up to the time of Tacitus, the political relations of the Quadi arc 
ohiefly with the confederacies of Maroboduus/* Catvalda, and the 
Regnum Vannianum. 

Afterwards they are chiefly with the Sarmatians of Hungary. 

I know no reasons, except a statement of Ammianus as to their 
arms being like those of the Sarmatce, and the likelihood of the name 
Vannius (gentis Quadorum) of the Regnum Vannianum being the 
Slavonic title Pan=Dominus, for making them Sarmatian rather 
than German. But these I think sufficient. Still, as they are a 
frontier population, the remark that applies to the Marsigni applies 
to the Quadi also. 



XLIII. Nee minus valent retro Marsigni, 1 Go- 
thini, 2 Osi, 3 Burii : 4 terga Marcomannorum, Quado- 
rumque claudunt : e quibus Marsigni, et Burii sermone 
cultuque Suevos referunt. Gothinos Gallica, Osos 
Pannonica lingua coarguit, non esse Germanos ; et 
quod tributa patiuntur : partem tributorum Sarmatse, 
partem Quadi, ut alienigenis, imponunt : Gothini, 
quo magis pudeat, et ferrum effodiunt : omnesque hi 
populi pauca campestrium, ceterum saltus et vertices 
montium jugumque insederunt. Dirimit enim scin- 

* See Epilegomena, § Quasi- Germanic Gauls, ad fin. 



NOTES ON SECTION XL1II. 155 

ditque Sueviam continuum montium jugum, ultra 
quod plurimse gentes agunt : ex quibus latissime patet 
Lygiorum 5 nomen in plures civitates diffusum. Va- 
lentissimas nominasse sufficiet, Arios, 6 Helveconas, 7 
Manimos, Elysios, Naliarvalos. 8 Apud Naharvalos 
antiquae religionis lucus ostenditur. Prsesidet sacerdos 
muliebri ornatu: 9 sed "deos, interpretatione Romana, 10 
Castorem Pollucemque " n ineniorant. Ea vis numini : 
nomen Alcis: 12 nulla simulacra, nullum peregrinse su- 
perstitionis vestigium: ut fratres tamen, ut juvenes 
venerantur. Ceterum Arii super vires, quibus enu- 
merates paullo ante populos antecedunt, truces, insitas 
feritati arte ac tempore lenocinantur : nigra scuta, 
tincta corpora : atras ad proelia noctes legunt : ipsaque 
formidine atque umbra feralis exercitus terrorem in- 
ferunt, nullo hostium sustinente novum ac velut in- 
fernum aspectum : nam primi in omnibus prceliis oculi 
vincuntur. Trans Lygios Gothones 13 regnantur, paullo 
jam adductius, quam ceterse Germanorum gentes, 
nondum tamen supra libertatem. Protinus deinde ab 
Oceano Rugii, 14 et Lemovii : l5 omniumque harum gen- 
tium insigne, rotunda scuta, breves gladii, et erga 
reges obsequium. 

NOTES ON SECTION XLIIL 

1 Marsigni.] — This is, almost certainly, the Roman mode of spell- 
ing Mars-ing-i. Why it should be so is difficult to say. The 
combinations ping-o, ling-o-, &c, are Latin. Perhaps, the Greek 
mode of expressing -ng- by yy may have determined the use of the g. 

The name itself is, probably, German = the Mars-ings. 

What does Mars- mean 1 Not March ; since they are distinguished 
from the Marco-manni. 

Perhaps Marsh. The country, however, is more mountainous than 
marshy. 



15G THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

Perhaps the river Afaros. It is not necessary, however, that it 
should have any ascertained meaning. 

I take the words " Marsigni sermone cultuque Suevos referunt" as 
they stand. 

It is against the principles laid down in a previous part of the 
work to lightly admit as Germanic any nation placed, like the 
Marsigni (terga Marcomannorum — claudunt) beyond the March. 

But it is also against other principles to treat a definite assertion 
of an author like Tacitus summarily. 

We must, also, take the word Suevus as he understood it, i.e., as 
meaning German — not as his present commentator does, i.e., as 
meaning Slavonic. 

Hence, there are no great objections against the Marsigni being 
considered German — or, rather, as they are a frontier population, 
and, consequently, involving no serious error either one way or the 
other, there is no need for an over-scrutinizing criticism. 

The same applied to the Quadi and Narisci. 

2 Gothini.'] — The -n- here is almost certainly of the same inflexional 
or non-radical character with the -n- in Goth-owes ; and the same 
criticism, in other respects, applies to it. — See note in v. Gothones. 

In Ptolemy we find that beyond the Baivoxalfxai (Bavarians) 
were the Batini. — 'Ynep ovc (Bcuvo^a/juove) TSareivo), ical en vizep 
tovtovq, inro to 'A(TKi€ovpywi> opog KopicovTOi, icai Aovyioi ot Bovpoi, 
fJ-tXP 1 r V£ xttyaXiJQ tov OviarovXa Trorafxov. 'Ytto ce tovtovq, TrpuiTOL 
2t'£wv£c> tira Koyvot, situ Oviatovpytoi, VTrep tov 'Opicvvtov Spv/xov. 
Now Zeuss considers that Koyvot is a fault in the MSS. for Ko'rvot, 
which is likely enough. He also thinks that the Ko'rvot are the 
lioTivoi of Dion Cassius, and that the KoVtvot of Dion Cassius are the 
Gothini of Tacitus — which is likely too. 

The iron-mines, combined with the statement as to their language, 
fix the Gothini in the Gallician Carpathians. 

Gallica — lingua. — I know no reasons for believing that the 
name Ealitsch, the Slavonic form for Gallicia is one whit less ancient 
than the names Gallia, Britannia, Italia, Hellas, &c. 

Until I do, I translate Gallica by Gallician ; considering that the 
same similarity, with the same likelihood of creating error, between 
words as like as the form out of which Gallicia grew, and that out 
of which the Romans formed Galli and the Greeks TaXaVat, ex- 
isted in the time of Tacitus as now. 



NOTES ON SECTION XLIIL 157 

3 Osi.] — No other writer but Tacitus unequivocally mentions any 
tribe with a name like that of Osi, in the neighbourhood of the 
south-eastern March. The Osii of Ptolemy are too far north to 
coincide with them. These are a people beyond the Veltse (Ove'Xtcu), 
a Lithuanic nation on the Baltic — UdXiv £e rrjv /jiev ife^g tw 
OveveSiKui ku\ttg) irapwKzaviTiv Kareyovcriv OveXrai, i/7T£p ovq "Qoiol, 
elra KdpSioveg apKrazuiraToi ; a people whose name Zeuss is probably 
right in connecting with that of the island Osilia—Oesel. — P. 272. 

I say that no writer but Tacitus unequivocally mentions any tribe 
with a name like that of the Osi, in the neighbourhood of the south- 
eastern March ; and I now draw attention to the qualifying word 
unequivocally. What if the Ovirr^ovpycoi be the people of Qvio- 
Sovpy-, as they almost certainly were, and Ov"«r€ovpy- be the burg or 
berg of the Osi 1 

Whether the -ftovpy- in Ovia€ovpyioi=berg=hill, or burgh- 
borough, i.e., whether the compound be a word like Konings-6er^, or 
a word like Ham-burg, is of no great consequence. The word is a 
German one. Yet it by no means follows that the nation it desig- 
nated was German. 

Wisburg (or Wisberg) might be a German name for a Slavonic 
locality, just as Liefland (Livonia) and Courland are. 

It might also (as suggested in p. 97), in the hands of a Greek 
writer, take the form Asciburgius Mons. 

That the Osi were not German is Tacitus's own statement. 

The complement to this note is not. in vv. Aravisci ab Osis — Osi 
ah Araviscis, p. 96, &c. 

The hypothesis is as follows : — 

a. That the population from the Asciburgius Mons, or the Carpa- 
thians between Gallicia, Moravia, and Upper Hungary, was once 
continuous with that of Croatia ; the northern portion of it being 
called, by the Germans, Osi. 

b. The invasion of the Germans of the Danube broke up this 
continuity. 

c. But not wholly. Within the German area (probably in the 
mountain strongholds of the Luna SUva=Jablunka Berg), isolated 
portions of the Osi preserved their language. 

4 Bicrii.'] — What applies to the Marsigni applies to the Burii. 
They may be considered German as long as there is no stronger 
objection lying against them than their situation beyond the March, 



158 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

and as long as that objection is met by the special statement that 
their tongue was Suevic, i.e., in the eyes of Tacitus, German. 

But there is a stronger objection. It will be seen in the next 
note that Ptolemy places them in the same category with the Lygii. 

5 Lygiorum.~\ — Here, according to Tacitus, we have a generic term 
like Gallm and Sueow. 

Neither is there any reason to doubt his evidence. On the con- 
trary it is confirmed in more quarters than one. 

1. Ptolemy gives the same generic power to the word — "Y-ko Ze tovq 
Bouyoi/vrac Aovyioi ol 0/.iai'ol, hip' ovq Auvyioi ol Aoui/ot, f*£XP L T °v 
' Aant^vpyiov bpovq .... teat Aovyioi ol Bou poi, ^f'xP' T0 " OinarovXa 
■Korajjiov. 

2. The extract from Nestor* confirms Ptolemy: — "When the 
Wallachians attacked the Slovenians — the Slovenians went forth, 
and settled on the River Vislje (Vistula), and called themselves 
Lekhs (Ljachove). And some of these people were called Poles, some 
Luticzi, some Pomoranians." 

This does something more than confirm Ptolemy. It shows that 
the root Lelch was Slavonic, i.e., the native name by which the 
Slavonians of the Vistula called themselves, rather than the name 
by which they were called by their non- Slavonic neighbours. 

That the name of Lekh was recognised by other writers than 
Nestor, indeed, that it was a common designation, is shown by the 
hypothesis of the later chronicles, where it becomes the name of the 
eponymus of the Poles. Tshekh and Lekh are the two leaders of 
two great nations ; the first of the Poles, the second of the Bohe- 
mians. Of the latter, the present native name is Tshekh; of the 
former, Lekh was the original denomination. 

Hence the name Lekh in Nestor's time, at least, was native. 

After this, does any reader doubt the identity between the Lygii 
of Tacitus and the Poles 1 or, admitting this, does he believe the 
Lygii to have been German 1 

Amongst ethnologists, Zeuss, for one, insists on this latter view. 

I confess that it strikes me unfavourably that he has kept back 
the identity of locality, combined with the similarity of sound 
between the Lekh of Nestor, and the Lygii of Tacitus. Whether we 
look to his remarks on the former word (p. 126), or the latter (p. 

* Prolegomena, p. xxiii. 



NOTES ,TO SECTION XLIIL 159 

662), we find abundant signs of readiness to associate similar words 
with the one under consideration. Thus (in vv. Poloni, Wenden) 
he expends some ingenuity in showing the probability of the Lekh 
of Nestor, and the Asv^avrjvoi of Constantine Porphyrogenita being 
identical. He also shows some research in tracing the names in the 
Icelandic writings of Snorro (as Lcesjar) and in the Latin of Witi- 
kind (Liciaviki). 

Then in v. Lygii he enumerates the slightly varied forms Ligii, 
Lugii, Aoiot, Aovyioi, Lugiones, Aoyiwvzg, Lupiones, and hints at an 
etymological connection with the root long. But, with all this 
there is not a single reference from Lygii to Lekh, nor yet any from 
Lekh to Lygii ; so that the very important fact of similarity of 
name coinciding with identity of area, is not even recognised as a 
complication worth investigating. 

Pole is a geographical, rather than a national, term, and means 
occupants of plains. Pole=])lain, and Polak-=an inhabitant of a 
plain. Of this Polacy is the plural form. Nestor writing in Old 
Slavonic, has the form Poljane. Hence the Latin form Polonia — 
" Inter Alpes Hunnise et Oceanum est Polonia, sic dicta in eorum 
idiomate quasi Campania.'''' — Zeuss, p. 662. 

The d in the English form Poland, has been introduced by the 
same process of confusion which converts asparagus into sparrow- 
grass, i.e., the tendency to identify a like term in a foreign, with 
some real one in the native tongue. 

The situation of the Lygii of Tacitus is that of the Lekhs of 
Nestor. 

The present Poles are the Lekhs of Nestor under another name. 
This is admitted by Zeuss. — " The name Lech, originally a general 
name given by the eastern to the western branch of Slavonians, 
must most frequently have been applied to those who lived nearest, 
viz., the Poles. At length, after ceasing to be a general appellation, 
it became fixed as their special designation." — P. 662. 

With all this, not a word about Lekh being even like Lyg-ii. 

But it may be said that the assumption of a migration in the case 
of the Slavonic Lekhs is legitimate, inasmuch as it is suggested by 
the very passage of Nestor lately quoted. 

Be it so. There would still stand over the very remarkable fact 
that the very area in which these immigrant Lekhs settled, should 
be an area occupied by a people with a name almost identical with 
their own. What should we say to a writer who argued that Boston 



160 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

in the United States was, very likely, wholly unconnected with 
Boston in England ; that it was an aboriginal American name ; that 
by mere chance, 'the Bostonians of Lincolnshire fell in with a place 
named like their native town; and that by mere chance the aboriginal 
Bostonians of Massachusetts were displaced by a population bearing 
the same name as themselves 1 

But chey might have taken their name from that of the earlier 
Lygii. Not so. The tradition about the eponymus Lech is strong 
evidence in favour of its being native. What Anglo-Saxon ever 
called himself a descendant of Brut ; or placed Brut at the head of 
his genealogy 1 

11 Arii — Jfanimi—EIi/sii.] — I can throw no light on these names, 
unless the Man-imi be the Lygii O-man-i of Ptolemy. 

7 Ilelveconas.] — 'PovtocXeiwv $e ecu TiovyovvTwv (fXETa.lv Ke'ivrai) 
AlXovatwveg. — Ptolemy. They, probably, are part of the duchy of 
Posen ; possibly Slavonians of the river Hevel. 

8 iVaharvalos.] — To what appears in the text I can add but little 
about the Naharvali. 

The termination -vcd has been considered Germanic, i.e., = the 
-phal in West-phal-ia, and other similar compounds. 

It is not, however, exclusively so. A form so near it as gal is 
Lithuanic, and, perhaps, Slavonic as well. — " Letti, qui proprie 
dicuntur Let-gcdl-i. — Letti vel Lett-gall-i adhuc pagani." This is 
from Henry the Lett, speaking of the Letts of Livonia. Nestor, a 
Russian, has the form Sjet-gola. 

Again — the old inhabitants of part of Samogitia are not only 
Samo-gitce, but Sem-i-gaU-i, San-gal-i, and iSam-gal-i, in the older 
Latin writers, and Zim-gola in Nestor. 

Again — "Swiatha (sc. fluvius) ex Samogitia, cujus fons prope Vil- 
komiriam et in villa Hemy-gola, ostia circa Mariewerder, et hie 
dividit Lithuaniam et Samogitiam." — Dlugoss. 

Is it safe then to say that such internal evidence as is derived 
from the element -vol in favour of the Nahar-i>a^ being German is 
neutralized by the Lithuanic terminations. The meaning of the 
word is uncertain. All that is certain is, that the word is a com- 
pound. 

Yicto-hali (Yicto-ali, Yicto-vali), and Th.a,i-phali, seem to be 



NOTES ON SECTION XLIII. 161 

similar compounds. These are the names of populations on the 
Lower Danube — German in the eyes of most writers, Slavonic in 
those of the present. 

For further notice of the Naharvali, see remarks on the Nadrovitce, 
p. 173. 

9 Muliebri ornatu.] — Adam of Bremen describes the priests of the 
ancient Courlanders, not indeed as dressing as women, but as monks. 
" Divinis, auguribus, atque necromanticis omnes domus sunt plenas, 
qui etiam vestitu monachico induti sunt." — De Situ Danise, c. 223. 

10 Interpretations Bomand.] — The commentary upon the principles 
which determine the choice of a given deity in one country as the 
equivalent, parallel, or analogue to one in another, would be one of 
great length. They are, however, referable to two heads :— ~ 

1. The correspondence may be suggested by similarity of name ; 
or — 

2. The correspondence may be suggested by similarity of attributes. 
If what is written on the names Hercules, Isis, &c, be correct, we 

have instances of both principles in Tacitus. 

a. Isis (see note in vocem) seems determined by the former process. 

b. Hercules by the latter. 

c. For Mars, Mercury, and Pollux, a case may be made out* either 
way. 

11 Castorem Pollucemque.] — The Slavonic mythology has two asso- 
ciated gods, named Lei and PoleL 

Without being able to say that, beyond their duality, and the 
name of one of them, there is anything to connect them with the 
Castor and Pollux of Tacitus, I am not afraid of saying that the 
German mythology has nothing equally similar, be this similarity 
little or much. 

12 Alcis.] — I believe this ale- to be simply Lithuania 
Hartknoch, in his Dissertatio de Diis Prussorum minoribus, writes, 

" Inter /eras Prussi veteres in primis alcem (the elk) divino prose- 
quebantur honore, ut testis est Erasmus Stella, in Lib. ii. Antiq. 
Boruss. Nee dubium est quin aliis quoque animalibus divini 
honores sint delati."— § 7. 

The fact of a thing or person named Ale- being an object of 

M 



162 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

worship to the Lithuanians is an unexceptionable inference from this 
passage. Its identity with the quadruped elk is, probably, a mis- 
apprehension of the author's. 

13 Golhone$.~] — Reasons for considering the Gothones to be M&tii 
under a Slavonic name, will be found in not. ad v. jEstii. 

The -n is, almost certainly, an inflexional elemant rather than a 
part of the root. 

It may be German, i.e., the -n in East-an and other similar weak 
forms. 

But it may also be Slavonic, i.e., the -n, in such forms as Pol- 
jane, A:c. 

That the radical part (Goth-) is Slavonic, is in the highest degree 
probable. 

But for this vid. hit): in v. JEstii, and Epilegomena, § Goths. 

14 Rugii.] — For the quotation which, notwithstanding its late 
date, and the objections which will be noticed a few sentences 
onwards, must stand as the chief text concerning this term, see 
Prolegomena, p. xix. 

It relates to the Rugiani, Runi, Rani, or Verani ; * the Slavonians 
of the Isle of Rugen, in the ninth century. Zeuss, from whom I 
take it, adds, ho\vever, that it has nothing in common with the Ger- 
man gentile name Rugi, and that the coincidence is purely accidental. 
" Rugia, Rugen, nichts mit dem deutschen VoUcsnamen Rugi gemein 
hat und das tjebereinkommen rein zufdllig ist." 

If this mean the Rugii of the fifth century (see Epilegomena, 
§ Rugii) I agree with him ; but not, if it mean the Rugii of Tacitus. 
For more, see next note. 

15 Lemovii.~\ — If we admit the parts about the rivers Dwina and 
Memel to be the locality of the Lemovii, we may deal with the 
word as a derivative ; in which case the radical part of the word 
will be the syllable Lem-. 

Adam of Bremen mentions the Lami as being the neighbours of 
the Curi of Courland. 

Pomponius Sabinus (about a.d. 1480) mentions the Lcem-omi. 
Dusberg speaks of the Terra Zam-otina. 

* See Epilegomena, § Angli. 



NOTES ON SECTION XLIII. 163 

Now, though all this is taken from the 682nd page of Zeuss, 
when speaking of the Lami, not one word of it appears in p. 155, 
where he notices the Lemovii. On the contrary, he finds nothing- 
nearer these last-named tribes in sound and geography than the Lim- 
fiord of Jutland. Yet Tacitus' s locality of the Lemovii is certainly 
not very far from that of the Lami. 

Zeuss does all this ; nay, more, he does it in the face of two 
remarks of his own — viz., that the derivational element ov (Lem- 
ov-ii) appears in no other German word, and that in some MSS. of 
Tacitus the reading was Lemonii. 

Now these Lami are the Liven, i.e., the most western branch of the 
Ugrian Finns of Esthonia, a nation now nearly extinct, having been 
encroached on by the Germans, and the Letts of Livonia (Zie/'-land); 
Livonia, of which the name is referable to these early, but now 
displaced, occupants. 

The change from m to v was not immediate. Nestor gives the 
intermediate form Lib. 

Now what if some place, in the name of which the combination 
R-g occurs, be nearer these Liv-en than even the Isle of Rugen? 

In this case we have a complication — a complication which arises 
from the fact that, although the Isle of Rugen may be a likely place 
for the Rugii of Tacitus, as against the Rugii of the Odoacer, it is 
not so against the locality, or the people (be it which it may) from 
which the present town of Riga takes its name. Less prominent 
in history than the Rugii of Rugen, they are nearer the Lami — and 
this gives us a composition of difficulties. 

Again — Ptolemy has a place called Touytov on the mouth of the 
Oder, and there is a Roga-land in Scandinavia. Upon the whole, I 
think the Rugii of Tacitus are the people of the Gulf of Riga. 



XLIV. Suionum 1 hinc civitates, ipso in Oceano, 
prseter viros armaque classibus valent : forma navium 
eo differt, quod utrimque prora paratam semper ap- 
pulsui frontem agit : nee velis ministrantur, nee remos 
in ordinem lateribus adjungunt. Solutum, ut in qui- 



164 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

busdam fluminum, et mutabile, ut res poscit, hinc vol 
illinc remigium. Est apud illos et opibus honos : 
eoque unus imperitat, nullis jam exceptionibus, non 
precario jure parendi ; nee arm a, ut apud ceteros Ger- 
manos, in promiscuo, sed clausa sub custode, et quidem 
servo : quia subitos hostium incursus prohibet Oce- 
an us. Otiose porro armatorum manus facile lasci- 
viunt : enimvero neque nobilem, neque ingenuum, 
ne libertinum quidem armis procponere regia utilitas 
est. 

NOTE ON SECTION XLIV. 

1 Suionum.] — The -n is no part of the root, but an inflexion — the 
-n of the weak declension ; the Anglo-Saxon form being Sve-an, and 
the Icelandic Svi-ar. The common compound, however, is Svi-]>iod 
= the Svi-people ; the plod being the same as the Deut- in 
Deutsche. 

The present Swedish name for Swe-den is Sve-rige, a word like 
biskop-ric—the kingdom (ric) of the Sulci. 

This shows that the language of the first informants about the 
Suiones was a Gothic dialect. 

But it does not show that the root Sui- was Gothic. This, like 
the root Kent- in the Anglo-Saxon forms Kent-ing and Cant-ware, 
may belong to another language. 

This reduces the internal evidence of the Suiones of Tacitus having 
been Gothic to the single fact that the root Sui- enters in the name 
of the Swedes — a fact (as has been suggested in the remarks on the 
words Suevi and Saxo) by no means conclusive. Still it is, per- 
haps, prima facie evidence. 



XLV. Trans Suionas aliud mare pigrum, 1 ac prope 
immotum, quo cingi cludique terrarum orbem hinc 
fides: quod extremus cadentis jam solis fulgor in 
ortus edurat, adeo clarus, ut sidera hebetet. Sonum 



NOTES ON SECTION XLV. 165 

insuper emergentis audiri, formasque deorurn, et radios 
capitis 2 aspici persuasio adjicit. Illuc usque (et fama 
vera) tantum natura. Ergo jam dextro Suevici maris 3 
litore iEstiorum gentes 4 alluuntur: quibus ritus habi- 
tusque Suevorum, lingua Britannicae propior. 5 Ma- 
trem deum venerantur: insigne superstitionis, formas 
aprorum gestant. Id pro armis omnique tutela, : se- 
curum deae cultorem etiam inter hostes prsestat. 
Rarus ferri, frequens fustium usus. Frumenta cete- 
rosque fructus patientius, quam pro solita, Germa- 
norum inertia, laborant. Sed et mare scrutantur; 
ac soli omnium succinum, quod ipsi glesum vocant, 
inter vada atque in ipso litore legunt. Nee, quae 
natura, quaeve ratio gignat, ut barbaris, quaesitum com- 
pertumve. Diu quinetiam inter cetera ejectamenta 
maris jacebat, donee luxuria nostra dedit nomen : 
ipsis in nullo usu ; rude Iegitur, informe perfertur, 
pretiumque mirantes accipiunt. Succum tamen ar- 
borum esse intelligas, quia terrena quaedam atque 
etiam volucria animalia plerumque interlucent, quae 
implicata humore, mox durescente materia, cludun- 
tur. Fecundiora igitur nemora lucosque, sicut Ori- 
entis secretis, ubi thura balsamaque sudantur, ita 
Occidentis insulis terrisque inesse crediderim, quae 
vicini solis radiis expressa atque liquentia in proxi- 
mum mare labuntur, ac vi tempestaturn in adversa 
litora exundant. Si naturam succini admoto igne 
tentes, in modum tedae accenditur, alitque flammam 
pinguem et olentem : mox ut in picem resinamve 
lentescit. Suionibus Sitonum gentes continuantur. 
Cetera similes, uno differunt, quod femina dominatur : 6 
in tantum non modo a libertate, sed etiam a servitute 
degenerant. Hie Sueviae finis. 



106 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

NOTES ON SECTION XLV. 

1 Aliud mare pig rum. ~\ — The Arctic Ocean. 
• Radios capitis.] — The Aurora Borealis (?). 

3 Suevici maris.] — The Norse form was probably something like 
Svi-haf,* just as Kord-hav, at the present moment— the North-sea ; 
haf being the Scandinavian word for both sea and ocean; in which 
case the -v in Suev-, is, really, the -v- in hav. 

At any rate, it seems safe to consider the formation of the word 
as applied to the Swedish Sea, as different from that of the Suev-, in 
Sut ci and Suevia ; though no such difference is recognized by 
Tacitus. 

Indeed, we must attribute some unsteadiness of expression to him 
here. 

a. The rites and customs of the jEstii are Suevic. — This may, 
possibly, apply to the Suevi of Suabia, and Franconia. 

b. II ic (beyond Finland) Suev ice finis. This can scarcely do so. 

4 jEstiorum gentcs.~\ — The word gentes prepares us to expect in 
jEstii — as in Suevi — a collective name. Such is, really, the case. 

That the JEstii of Tacitus were the occupants of the present coast 
of Prussia and Courland, is shown by what is said about the amber- 
trade. This fixes the locality as definitely as iEtna would fix Sicily, 
or Vesuvius Campania. 

Like Suiones, jEstii is a word from a Gothic informant. 

The form in which it reached Tacitus was probably Easte — i.e., 
the strong form of the grammarians. 

But the weak form was also used since, in a quotation which will 
soon appear, we find the form , H(rriu)VEQ=Eastan. 

As this is one of the three non-compound words,t for which I not 
only assume an etymology, but argue from it, I shall consider the 
form of the word somewhat at length. 

It, apparently, is not an unexceptionable form. Being a geogra- 
phical rather than a gentile name, we should expect to find it com- 

* With the article Svi-huv-et, like No?rl-hav-et. 
t See Prolegomena, p. liii. 



NOTES ON SECTION XLV. 167 

pound, i.e., in some form equivalent to East-mew, East-ware (like 
Cant-ware), East-Zcmd, or East-soe&m (like Dor-set). 

Failing this we should expect, at least, a derivative form such as 
Easter-^mc/, Jb&st-ing. 

The form, however, is simple ; just as if we said the Easts. 

Simple, however, as it is, the following extract from Alfred places 
its meaning beyond reasonable doubt : — " Seo Visle is swiSe 
micel ea, and hio to liS Vit-land, and Veonod-land, and J>set 
Vit-land, belimpe'S to Estwn, and seo Visle lift ut of Veonod-lande, 
and li'5 in Estmere, and se i^mere, is huru fiftene mila brad. 
Thonne cymeS Ilfing eastan in i^taiere, of J>sem mere ]>e Truso 
standee in stafte, and cumaS ut samod in Estmere Ilfing eastan 
of Eastl&nde, and Visle suSan of Veonodlande." 

It is as safe, then, to consider the word jEstii to mean the men of 
the East, as it is to consider the word German ; since — 

1. The form of the word coincides with its geographical import. 

2. The particular word in question is 'known to have been applied 
by the Germans to the particular parts in question. 

3. There is no other language but the German in which it occurs 
with the same power. 

4. The German name for the present Esihonians is Esthen ; their 
country being Est-land. 

This last fact suggests an objection. 

It may be said to prove too much, i.e., to prove that these sup- 
posed JEstian the Eastern populations are not sufficiently in the East, 
i.e., that the true Eastern countries of the Baltic are on the Gulf of 
Finland. 

Alfred's evidence meets this. 

Again — the fact of the Esthonians being the present Esthen, or 
men of the East, is by no means conclusive as to the Esthonians 
having been the JEstii of Tacitus. A term like the one in question 
would apply to different- countries according to the advance of 
geographical knowledge ; ceasing to be characteristic as soon as 
fresh tracts east of those which it originally designated by it became 
known. 

At any rate, the present Esthonia may have been the most eastern 
part of the JEstian country. 

Thirdly — at the mouth of the river Niemen, and nearly coinciding 
with the division between East Prussia and Courland, and coinciding 
equally nearly with the amber locality of the iEstii, the direction of 



168 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

the coast changes suddenly from east to north; so much so as to 
make the parts in question, for some time, the most eastern extre- 
mity of the Baltic. From Memel to Windau, the navigation is due 
north, and it is only by keeping along the coast that the Gulf of 
Riga is found to form a bend towards the east. The Gulf of Fin- 
land does so still more. But this is only for a while. Finland itself 
is nearly in the same longitude with Courland. 

Unless, then, we take in the Gulfs of Riga and Finland, the 
country of the JEstii is really the east-end of the Baltic. 

Furthermore — except for the purposes of a special trade, the 
gulfs in question were not likely to be visited ; since from the 
position of the islands Oesel and Dago, at the entrance of the Gulf 
of Riga, and the narrowness of the entrance of the Gulf of Fin- 
land, it was not necessary for even the most cautious coasters to 
follow the line of the land, on a voyage from Memel in Courland to 
Abo in Finland. 

It is likely, then, that those Germans, who applied the term JEstii 
to the Courlanders, made no account of the Gulfs of Riga and Fin- 
land ; in which cases the Curiscke Nehrung was rightly designated 
a< eastern, ica-' e'Sox*?''- 

We, however, who do make account of those great indentations, 
placed our East-men in Esthonia. 

The quotation alluded to is one from Stephanus Byzantinus — 
'ilor/wree, edrog irapa tw cvtikui wKeavoj ovg YLoootvovc 'Aprefii^opoc 
(pr](Ti, Ylvdeac 'tlariaiove. 

Pytheas is the voyager, whose account of the Baltic about 320 
B.C. is treated with some contempt by Strabo. — i. p. 63. 

However, it by no means follows that because the name was 
Gothic it applied to a Gothic population ; indeed, as far as we can 
get evidence for a negative fact, it is against the word JEstii being 
a native name. 

There is plenty of mention between the time of Tacitus and the 
eleventh century of these same JEstii; but it is only by writers who 
were themselves either Germans or adopters of the German geography 
that the name is Hcest-, Aist-, or some similar form. 

General, however, as the name is in the Germanic authorities, is 
it rare in those of Russia, Prussia, Poland 1 Probably, it is not to 
be found at all. Instead, thereof, we have the term Pruss {Prussian) 
or the more remarkable form Guddon. 

These remarks upon the form and origin of the word have been 



NOTES ON SECTION XLV. 169 

given at large, because Zeuss, who admits so many less probable deri- 
vations, not only keeps the adjective east entirely out of sight, but 
disguises the word by writing it Aisten, on the very inferior au- 
thority of Eginhart — " Litus australe Sclavi et Aisti et alise diversse 
incolunt nationes." — Vit. Car. Magn. c. 12. 

The existence of the amber-trade explains the reference made in 
the note upon the word Gothones to the present one. 

The locality of the amber-trade fixes the Gothones even as it does 
the iEstii, and by fixing them in the same locality at the same time 
identifies the two. 

This identification is of so much importance that the details of the 
proof will be given minutely. 

Pliny's form is Guttones. 

Tacitus's in the Annals (ii. 62) Gotones ; in the present text 
Gothones. 

Ptolemy's TvduviQ. 

Pliny's locality is jEstuarium* Oceani Mentonomon nomine. 

Tacitus's trans Lygios, i.e., north of Poland. 

Ptolemy's irapd rov O.viarrovXav -irorafibv biro rovg Ovevtdag. 

Pliny connects them with the amber-country. 

That the Koaaivoi of Artemidorus is the same word is likely ; the 
oo—tt, as in BaXdrra and SaXdaaa, &c. 

Now, the notices of the amber-country might reach the Greeks or 
Romans by two routes. 1. It might come across the continent ; and 
that, wholly by land, or by the Vistula, Theiss, and Danube, or by 
the Priepetz and Dnieper. In this case the carriers of the article, 
and the informants as to its country and collectors, would be Slavo- 
nians. 

2. It might come by sea, in which case Germans would be — par- 
tially at least — the carriers of the article, and the informants as to 
its country and collectors. 

Now it is clear, that, if the Germans had one term, and the 
Slavonians another, for a nation in the amber- country, that nation 
would be known to a Greek or Roman under two names ; and it is 
nearly certain that this was the case in the present instance. The 
Gothones were JEstii when the notice came from Germany. The 
.jEstii were Gothones when the notice came from Slavonia. 

Lest this should seem an over-refinement, we must remember that, 
if JEstii = Este = Eastmen, and if the jEstian tongue were as 

* Probably, no true Mstuarium, but the word Est-ware misunderstood. 



170 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

Tacitus makes it, something other than German, a second name is 
a matter of necessity— since the one in Tacitus (jEstii) could not 
possibly be native. Yet a native name must have existed, and what, 
in the present stage of the argument, is more likely than Gothon 
(Gutton) 1 

When Tacitus follows the coast-line of the Baltic, he comes to the 
uEstii. \\ hen he starts from the Marcomanni and Lygii, he reaches 
the Gotlwnes. 

His expression trans Lygios is one of remarkable accuracy. The 
line which separates the most northern province of Poland (Masovia) 
from East Prussia, is also the line which separates the nations speak- 
ing the dialects derived from the iEstian or Gothonic, from the 
nations speaking the dialects descended from Lekh or Polish. 

The extent to which the German name was unknown to the 
Sarmatians, and vice versa, is shown in more ways than one, and it 
easily accounts for Tacitus's describing the same people under different 
designations, when we approached the notice of their country from 
different quarters. That the Sarmatian name was either Pruss or 
Guddon has been already stated ; and it is safe to say from the 
following remarkable address of Theodoric, the Ostrogoth, to the 
people of the amber-country, that if they were Goth-ic in any way, 
it was an unknown fact to the Goths of Italy. 

" Ha?stis Theodoricus rex. Illo et illo legatis vestris venientibus 
grande vos studium notitire nostra? habuisse cognovimus ; ut in 
Oceani litoribus constituti, cum nostra mente jungamini : suavis nobis 
admodum et grata petitio, ut ad vos perveniret fama nostra, ad quos 
nulla potuimus destinare mandata. Amate jam cognitum, quern 
requisistis ambienter ignotum. Nam inter tot gentes viam prsesu- 
mere, non est aliquid facile concupiisse. Et ideo salutatione vos 
affectuosa requirentes, indicamus succina, qua? a vobis per harum 
portitores directa sunt, grato animo fuisse suscepta, quse ad vos Oceani 
unda descendens, hanc levissimam substantiam, sicut et vestrorum 
relatio continebat, exportat ; sed unde veniat, incognitum vos habere 
dixerunt, quam ante omnes homines patria vestra offerente suscipitis. 
Haec quodam Cornelio scribente legitur in interioribus insulis 
Oceani ex arboris succo defiuens, unde et succinum dicitur, paulatim 
solis ardore coalescere. Fit enim sudatile metallum teneritudo per- 
spicua, modo croceo colore rubens, modo flammea claritate pingue- 
scens, ut cum in maris fuerit delapsa confinio, aestu alternante 
purgata, vestris litoribus tradatur exposita. Quod ideo judicavimus 



NOTES ON SECTION XLV. 171 

indicandum, ne omnino putetis notitiam nostram fugere, quod 
occultum creditis vos habere. Proinde requirite nos saepius per vias t 
quas amor vester aperuit. Quia semper prodest divitum regum 
acquisita concordia, qui dum parvo munere leniuntur, majore semper 
compensatione prospiciunt. Aliqua vobis etiam per legatos vestros 
verbo mandavimus, per quos quae grata esse debeant nos destinasse 
declaramus." — Cassiod. Variar. v. 2. 

The further confirmation which this view receives from the facts 
connected with the modern name Guddon is exhibited in Epilego- 
mena, § Goths. 

5 Lingua Britannica? propior.] — Here an author like Tacitus 
commits himself to a definite statement, and it must not be set 
aside on light grounds. Either the a priori probabilities against 
it must be great, or some reasonable origin of the mistake must 
be pointed out. 

The latter can be done — not exactly as the statement about the 
Gothini was explained, but in a somewhat similar manner. The 
language that the people of the amber-coast really spoke when they 
first become definitely known, was the Prussian. Now the form of 
the name which that language took was sufficiently like the word 
British to be mistaken for it. 

1. First, we must remember that Tacitus's information came from 
Germany. 

2. Next, that the word meaning Prussian was not German. The 
Germans got it from the Slavonians, and, consequently, were likely 
to confound it with some more familiar term. 

3. The word denoting British was such a familiar term. 

4. The adjectival termination was nearly the same in both lan- 
guages. 

This prepares us for the evidence in favour of words at present so 
unlike as Prussian and British ever having been like. 

The first occurrence of the name of the modern kingdom of Prussia 
occurs in Gaudentius, who accompanied Bishop Adalbert to that 
country between a.d. 997 — 1006. 

Zeuss, from whom, as usual, I am taking my best facts, admits 
that the term was Slavonic. " Der Name wird zuerst — ohne Zweifel 
von Slawen gehort." — p. 671. 

He also suggests that no argument against its antiquity is to be 
taken from its being there recorded by a German for the first time. 



172 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

It might have been as old as the name Mstii. " 1st der Name Prusi 
so alt, als der Name Aisten, wenn er auch mehr als ein Jahrtausend 
spiiter auftritt." — Ibid. 

Gaudentius's form is not Prussi but Pruzzi. 

Dietmar's form is also not Prussi but Pruci. 

Adam's of Bremen is also not Prussi but Pruzzi and Prutzci. 

This shows that the sound was that of ts, or tsh, or, possibly, even 
shish rather than of a simple -s ; a matter of some importance, as it 
helps to account for the t required to make the root Pruss- like the 
root Brit-. 

Now comes the important fact thai, we find the word taking an 
adjectival form in -en, in which case the s becomes tk. The substan- 
tival forms are Pruzzi, Prussi, Pruscia, Pruschia, Prutzci, Prussia ; 
but the adjectival ones are Prutheni, Pruthenia, Pruthenicus. We 
are now gecting near the form Britannicus ; and it must be remem- 
bered that the form thus similar, is the form almost always used 
when the language is spoken of — lingua Prulhenica not Prima. 

The root Puss undergoes a similar series of transformation — 
Russi, Russia, Ruthenicus, Ruihenia. 

Lastly, the form Borussi accounts for the B. 

All this, however, it may be said, applies to the Latin language, 
and is, consequently, out of place ; the question being whether 
Slavonian forms of the root Prus can become sufficiently like an 
equivalent modification of the root Brit- to create confusion. They 
can. The Slavonic word which a German would translate by 
Brittisc, and a Roman by Britannica, would be Brit-skaja, and the 
similar equivalent to Pruttisc and Pruthenica, Prut-s/coya. 

This gives us then the iEstii and Gothones (or rather the iEstii 
or Gothones) as the representatives of the old Prussians or Lithu- 
anian Sarmatians of the Baltic. 

In the twelfth, thirteenth, and fourteenth centuries, when infor- 
mation becomes sufficiently clear to give us the details of the nations 
and tribes allied to the jEstii, we find them to be as follows : — 

1. The Galind-itce, the TaXivdat of Ptolemy. 

2. The Sudo-vitce, conterminous with the Galinditoe, both being 
in the neighbourhood of the Spirding-See. 

3. The Pomesani, on the right bank of the Lower Vistula. 

4. Pogesani on the Frische Haf. 

5. Warmienses, Jarmenses, Hermini, and the people of the Orma- 
and of the Old Norse Sagas ; between the Po-gesani and the — 



NOTES ON SECTION XLV. 173 

6. Naitangi, on the Pregel. 

7. Barthi. 

8. Nadro-vitae. — A case may, perhaps, be made out for the Nadro- 
vitce being the Nahar-vali, under a slightly modified name ; the 
facts and reasoning running thus : — 

a. Both agree in being a population to which the preeminently 
holy seat of worship of their stock belonged. Thus, whilst the 
Naharvali were as they are described by Tacitus, the IS&dro-vitce, 
obstinate in their Paganism, above even the other obstinately Pagan 
Lithuanians, are thus described : — " Fuit autem in medio nationis 
hujus perversa^ scilicet in Nadrovia, locus quidam didus Eomow, 
trahens nomen suum a Roma, in quo habitabat quidam dictus Criwe, 
quern colebant pro Papa. Quia sicut dominus Papa regit univer- 
salem ecclesiam fidelium, ita ad istius nutum seu mandatum non 
solum gentes prcedictos, sed et Lethowini et alias nationes Livonia^ 
terras regebantur" — Dusb. iii. 5. 

b. The -d- in Nadro- may be got rid of by supposing some older 
form Nador, in which case, the ejection of the -d- is not only allow- 
able but likely ; since it is a consonant which, when it comes between 
two vowels, is often omitted in pronunciation, e.g., Sa-d-el in Danish 
is sounded Sa'el, &c. This would reduce Nador- to Naor-, or Naliar-. 

c. The elements -vit and -gal, if they do not exactly replace each 
other in certain Lithuanic names, are found attached to the same root 
in the words S&mo-gitce (also Samo-wfce), and Qemi-galli, the names 
of two scarcely distinguishable sections (or subsections) of the same 
population. 

9. Sam-bike. 
10. Scalo- vito3. 

These details nearly coincide with the more general account of 
Dusburg (iii. 3). — " Terra Pruschise in undecim partes dividitur. 
Prima fuit Cidmensis et Lubavia, quse ante introiturn fratrum domus 
Teutonics quasi fuerat desolata. Secunda Pomesania, in qua Pome- 
sani. Tertia Pogesania, in qua Pogesani. Quarta Warmia, in qua 
Warmienses. Quinta Nattangia, in qua Nattangi. Sexta Sambia, 
in qua Sambitos. Septima Nadrovia, in qua JVadrovita?. Octava 
Scalovia, in qua Scalovitas. Nona Sudovia, in qua Sudovitce. Decima 
Galindia. Undecima Barihe et Plica Bariha, quce nunc major et 
minor Bartha dicitur, in qua Barthi vel Barthenses habitabant. Vix 
aliqua istarum nationum fuit, quse non haberet ad bellum duo millia 
virorum equitum, et multa millia pugnatorum." 



174 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

These were the tribes and nations akin to the JEstll of Tacitus 
in East and West Prussia — the speakers of the language which was 
said to be Britanniae propior, and which really was Pruthenica* 

All the previous names were native and Lithuanian, since there 
was a native Lithuanian eponymus for each, as may be seen in the 
following extract from a fragment of a work, De Borussorum 
origine ex Domino Christiano j Christian being the first Prussian 
bishop. — " Duces fuere duo, nempe Bruteno et Wudawutto, quorum 
alterum scilicet Bruteno sacerdotem crearunt, alterum scilicet Wud- 
awutto in regem elegerunt . . Rex Wudawutto duodecim liberos 
masculos habebat, quorum nomina fuerunt Litpho, Saimo, Sudo, 
Naidro, Scalaivo, Natango, Bartho, Galindo, Warmo, Hoggo, Pomeszo, 
Chelmo . . . Warmo nonus filius Wudawutti, a quo Warmia dicta, 
reliquit uxorem Anna, unde Ermelandt/' 

Of Courland and Livonia, the JEstii of authentic history, and 
under their native names, are — 

1. The Curi, or Curones, from whom is derived the name of the 
country. 

2, 3, 4. The Letti, Ydumei and Selones of Livonia. 

6 Sitonum — femina dominatur.~\ — I cannot say to whose well- 
exercised ingenuity the interpretation of this curious passage is due. 
It is as follows : — 

The native name of the Finns of Finland (when they do not call 
themselves Suomelainen) is Qvam. 

The Swedish for woman is quinna. 

Either a misinterpretation of these two words, or else an ill-under- 
stood play upon them, gave rise to the notion of a female sovereign. 

This notion develops itself further. Alfred speaks of the Cvenas, 
and Cvena-land : but Adam of Bremen goes farther. — " Gothi habi- 
tant usque ad Bircam, postea longis terrarum spatiis regnant Sveones 
usque ad terram feminarum." — De Situ Danise, c. 222. " Et haec 
quidem insula terra? feminarum proxima narratur." — Ibid. 224. 

* How like, and how different, the two adjectives may be, is shown in 
the following columns : — 

English . . British . . Prussian. 

Latin . . Britannica . Pruthenica. 

Anglo-Saxon . Bryttisce . . Pryttisce. 

Slavonic . . Britskaja . . Prutskaja. 
Observe, too, that the names of both the Prussians and Britons is a form of 
the root Br-t. 



NOTES ON SECTION XLV. 175 

<c Circa htec litora — ferunt esse Amasonas, quod nunc terra femir- 
narum dicitur, quas aquae gustu aliqui dicunt concipere. . . Has, 
simul viventes spernunt consortia virorum, quos etiam, si advenerint> 
a se viriliter repellunt." — C. 228. 

Femina dominatur. — That a female should exercise regal power 
was extraordinary, not so much in the eyes of Tacitus (who, in 
the case of the British Boadicea, mentioned by him in the Agri- 
cola, merely remarks, neque enim sexum in imperiis discernunt, 
without any suggestion of the extent to which it is the measure of 
a servile temper on the part of the nation), but in those of the 
Germans who were the first informants about the Sitones. So 
early was the spirit which dictated the Salic law in force. 



XLVI. Peucinorum, Venedorumque, et Femiorum 
nationes Germanis an Sarmatis adscribam dubito : 
quamquam Peucini, quos quidam Bastarnas 1 vocant, 
sermone, cultu, sede, ac domiciliis, ut Germani agunt : 
sordes omnium ac torpor : procerum connubiis mixtis, 
nonnihil in Sarmatarum habitum foedantur. Venedi 2 
multum ex moribus traxerunt. Nam quidquid inter 
Peucinos Fennosque 3 sil varum ac montium erigitur, 
latrociniis pererrant. Hi tamen inter German os po- 
tius referuntur, quia et domos fingunt, et scuta ge- 
stant, et pedum usu ac pernicitate gaudent ; quae 
omnia diversa Sarmatis sunt, in plaustro equoque vi- 
ventibus. Fennis mira feritas, foeda paupertas : non 
arma, non equi, non penates : victui herba, vestitui 
pelles : cubile humus : sola in sagittis spes, quas inopia 
ferri, ossibus asperant. Idemque venatus viros pa- 
riter ac feminas alit. Passim enim comitantur, par- 
temque prsedse petunt. Nee aliud infantibus ferarum 
imbriumque suffugium, quam ut in aliquo ramorum 
nexu contegantur : hue redeunt juvenes, hoc senum 



17G THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

receptaculum. Sed beatius arbitrantur, quara inge- 
mere agris, illaborare domibus, suas alienasque for- 
tunas spe metuque versare. Securi adversus homines, 
securi' ad versus deos, rem difficillimam adsecuti sunt, 
ut illis ne voto quidem opus esset. Cetera jam fa- 
bulosa : " Hellusios et Oxionas 4 ora liominum vul- 
tusque, corpora atque artus ferarum gerere:" quod 
ego, ut incompertum, in medium relinquam. 

NOTES ON SECTION XLYI. 

1 Peucini — Bastarnas.] — The Bastamae took a prominent part in 
the wars of Philip, the father of Perseus, against the Romans. 
Persuaded to become his allies, they cross the Danube ; Cotto, one of 
their nobles, being sent forward as ambassador. It was part of 
Philip's plan to place the Bastarnse in the country of the Dardani, 
so that this latter nation (infestissima Macedonia?) might be destroyed 
by them, and then " Bastarnce, relictis in Dardania conjugihus libe- 
risque, ad populandum Italiam mdtterentur." 

They enter Thrace, the Thraciaus retire to Mount Donuca. Here 
the Bastarnse divide. Thirty thousand reach Dardania. The rest 
cross the Danube homewards. All this took place in the year of 
the death of Philip.— Livy, xl. 57, 58. 

Strabo's evidence is remarkable : — 'Ev %e rp ixtooyaia. Baorapvai 
[lev toic Tvpiyiratc opopoi teal TeppavoLg, ayelov ti kcli avrol rov 
Ytpfiavucov yivovg ovteq, tig 7r\eiio 0u\a $ir)pr)fxivoi. Kat yap 
"Ar/Jiovot Xeyovrai rivac* Kat 2i£dvfc, oi Be rrjv lievicrjy Karao^rWee, 
ri)y kv Tu>"laTpa) vfjaov, HevKtvoi. 

This seems the evidence upon which they are made German : 
Pliny having done so before, " Germanorum genera quinque — 
Quinta pars Peucini, Basternce . . con termini Dacis." — H. N. iv. 14. 

This has given the Bastarnse great prominence in ethnology ; 
since they have the credit of being the first Germans mentioned by 
name in history. 

Again — if the Basternae be German, the likelihood of the Getse 
being so is increased ; and the two supposed facts reflect probability 
on each other. Complications of this sort are of continual occurrence 
in ethnology. 



NOTES ON SECTION XLVI. 177 

It is just possible that the Bastarnse were Germans — not that I 
mean by this that the proper area of the Germans reached so far as 
Thrace and Moesia, the Bastarnic locality, but that the Germans of 
the Danube, might have begun their encroachments in an easterly 
direction thus early, and have reached thus far. They might have 
been intrusive Germans in the quarters where Livy places them. 

But it is far from being certain that even this supposition is 
necessary. Strabo's statement merely goes to their exhibiting Ger- 
man characteristics, and having Germans in their neighbourhood. 
Pliny is rarely to be taken as an independent witness. Tacitus 
speaks explicitly as to the most characteristic facts ; yet doubts as 
to the inference from them. In one point he is either wrong or in- 
explicable. If sede mean geographical position, his statement is 
wholly incompatible _with all that writers say about the locality 
of the Bastarnae (on the Lower Danube), and the limits of his own 
Germania. 

I think we may safely say that, in the passage of Strabo which 
makes the Bastarnae German, there is a qualifying expression of doubt, 
and in that of Tacitus doubt and unsatisfactory language as well. 

Reference to other writers increases rather than diminishes the 
complications. 

Livy's evidence makes them Gauls ; since he calls their leader in 
one place Clondicus dux Bastarnarum (xl. 58) and in another 
(applying to the same series of events) Clondicus, regulus Gallorum 
(xliv. 26). 

He also writes — " Per Scordiscos iter esse ad mare Hadriaticum 
Italiamque. Alia via traduci exercitum non posse. Facile Bas- 
tarnis Scordiscos iter daturos ; nee enim aut lingua aut moribus 
tequales abhorrere." 

Now whenever the Scordisci are referred to any of the recog- 
nized divisions of antiquity, they are called VaXdrai, or Galli— 
whether rightly or wrongly is another question. 

Plutarch does the same as Livy — 'YttekIvel Ee (nempe Perseus) kcu 
VaXdrar, tovq irEpl rov"l(JTpov <inr]fXEvovQ, ot Baarcipvai icaXovvrai. — 
Vit. Paul. ^mil. c. 9. 

The Bastarnse were distinguished from their neighbours — warlike 
as these were — by superior bravery, vast stature, and intense love of 
fighting — "AvSpEQ v\pr}\ol fXEv to. arw/jiara, Savfiaurol Se tclq jueXe'-ac, 
/LiEya\av)(pi Be ical Xafnrpoi toiq Kara rwc ttoXeixiijjv cnrEiXaig. — Plut. 
Vit. Paul. ^mil. 12. 



178 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

The fragment of Scymnus makes them immigrants or conquerors. 

Qvroi ce Qp^tc&g, Baordprat t imjXv^eg. 

Upon the whole the evidence of the Bastarna? being German is 
very inconclusive. 

-' Venedi.'] — The particular Venedi of Tacitus must have been 
those nations of the interior who were too far inland to be described 
with the JEstii and Sitones of the coast, and too far to the north 
and east to have been described with the Lygii and Burii, and 
those other populations which were approached from the south. 
These were chiefly the Lithuanians of Lithuania ; not, however, to 
the exclusion of some of the more eastern Slavonians. It is safe to 
suppose this ; since there is no trace of any distinction between the 
Lithuanians and Slavonians having been made by the Germans. 

3 Fennosque.~\ — The name Finn, as applied to the natives of Fin- 
land is not native. It is Gothic — both German and Norse. 

Neither is it native as applied to the Laplanders of Finmark ; 
although many of them have adopted it. 

Hence, the Romans took the names of the Baltic Finns from the 
Germans. 

From whom did the Germans take them ? 

A suggestion of Geyer's, adopted by Bahr, is much to the point. 
The Finnic root sxiom- means fen ; and many Finnic tribes call them- 
selves by names compounded of s-m. Thus, the Esthonians are 
So me-lassed=f en-men ; the Finlanders Suomelainen, the Laplanders 
Sabmelads, and the Karelians Suomaemejet. Lastly, the name Sa- 
moeid, which is not native,* and which is probably a Finn denomina- 
tion adopted by the Russians, is reasonably supposed to come from 
the same root. Putting all together, it is likely that the term Fen- 
or Fin- is the translation of Suom. 

At the present time the ethnology of the tribes allied to both the 
Finns of Finland, and Lapps of Lapland, is clear. Each section 
belongs to the great Ugrian stock. 

But it is the evidence of language which has given us this group. 
The evidence of physical conformation is more against than for it. 

At the time of Tacitus no such generalization was practicable— 

* The native name is Nvenez, or Khusovo=men. 



NOTES ON SECTION XLVI. 179 

since the languages were wholly unknown, and the evidence they 
supplied unappreciated. 

Hence the test was less refined. As a consequence of this, what 
we call Ugrian was, in the time of Tacitus, partly Finn and partly 
Sitonian. 

1. The first was the name where the physical conformation was 
that of the Lapps, a people to whom, at the present moment, the 
term Finn is limited by the Scandinavians of Norway and Sweden. 

2. The second was that where the physical conformation was not 
much different from that of the Germans ; and it comprised (probably 
with many other sections) the Qvcens or Finlanders — whose bulk 
and physical strength is by no means, palpably and contrastedly, 
inferior to that of the Swedes, Russians, and Lithuanians. Of these 
the Sitones (or Qvaens of Finland) were the chief. Tacitus makes 
them Sioevic ; by Suevic probably (but not indisputably) meaning 
Suionic. 

Now the separation of what we now called Ugrians into the 
Sitonians and Finns is, in reality, the natural inference from the 
remarkable contrast between the Ugrians of the Lapp type, and the 
Ugrians of the Finlandic ; a difference which exists at the present 
moment as strongly as ever it could have done in the time of 
Tacitus, a difference, too, which, even in the present days of ethno- 
logical classification, has been often overvalued. Hence, the separa- 
tion of the Sitones from the Fenni is no argument against the 
former being Finlanders, i.e., Qvcens, properly so called, Finns of 
Finland, improperly. It is just such a separation as many an 
ethnologist would make now. The difference which it is most 
important to remember is that between the words Qvasn and Finn 
as names — a difference which we of England draw less definitely 
than did Tacitus ; or, at least, Tacitus's informants. 

4 Hellusios et Oxionas.~\ — Upon the latter of these names I can 
throw but little light. On the former I can only remark the resem- 
blance of their name to Ptolemy's river Chalusus (XaXouffog iroTa/uog) 
and the Chali (Xn'Xot). 

But these are in the parts about the Lower Elbe, or the rivers of 
Mecklenburg, or the Eyder, or, perhaps, the Trave ; to the last of 
which the name Chalusus has been supposed to apply. Still, they 
may be the parts to which Tacitus refers ; notwithstanding the fact 
of the Hellusii being mentioned along with the Sitones and Finns 



180 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

of the extreme eastern end of the Baltic. His transitions from one 
geographical area to another are sometimes very abrupt ; whilst the 
characteristic which brings them within the same category with the 
Fenni and Sitones is the comparative obscurity of their history. 

Such being the case, I think it possible that, after having dis- 
patched the ill-understood families of Finland, Tacitus may take 
leave of his subject with a cursory notice of their equivalents, in 
obscurity, on the side of Denmark. 



EPILEGOMENA. 



§ I. THE DATE OF THE GERMANIA, AS COMPARED WITH THE OTHER 

WORKS OF TACITUS. GERMANIC POPULATIONS MENTIONED IN 

THE ANNALS AND HISTORY, BUT NOT IN THE GERMANIA. 

Niebuhr has expressed an opinion, that the Germania was 
written during the youth of Tacitus. 

Whatever other reasons there may be for holding this view, 
there is the following, — 

A writer in a monograph is generally fuller of details than 
he is in a general, work. Now in the Annals and History, 
there are several German tribes mentioned, of which no notice 
is taken in the Germania, and this omission is explained by 
the notion, that Tacitus' s knowledge increased between the 
composition of the different works. Strange as it is, that 
he should not have known the Sicambri, Ampsivarii, &c, 
when the Germania was written, it is stranger still, that he 
should have known and not enumerated them. 

Hence, the Annals and History are, to a certain extent, 
the complement to the Germania, and similarly to compare 
small things with great, the present Epilegomena form the 
complement to the Notes. 

Of the populations mentioned in the Annals and History, 
but not mentioned in the Germania, the following is the list. 

1. The Sicambri. — First mentioned by Cajsar on the Lower 
Rhine (see extracts p. lxxix.), the Sicambri take considerable 
prominence and importance in the reign of Augustus. Being 
conquered by Drusus, they appear more than once in the 
poetry of both Ovid and Horace, as formidable enemies now 
humbled. Indeed, few names were more associated with the 
ideas of murderous ferocity and savage bravery than that of 
the Sicamber. 



li THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

In a.l). 26, a Sicambra cohors was employed as far from 
its own country as Thrace. 

This is believed to have permanently settled in Hungary, on 
the very spot whereon the city of Buda was afterwards built. 
In a work quoted by Grimm, as Inscriptions Sacrosancta. 
Petitstatis, a stone said to have been dug - up, " in Buda veteri, 
Mathiae regis Qngariae tempore, dum fundamenta jacerentur 
aedium Beatricis reginse,' 1 bears the following inscription, — 
• Legio Sicambrorum hie praesidio collocata civitatem ocdifica- 
verunt quam ex suo nomine Sicambriam vocaverunt." 

The authenticity, however, of this stone is doubtful ; and, 
even if were not so, the ethnological fact it conveyed would 
be, in and of itself, minute and unimportant. It has been 
noticed, however, for a special reason. The fact of Sicam- 
brians on the Danube, as well as Sicambrians on the Rhine, 
has been admitted as undoubted. Instead, however, of the 
colony btin.;- allowed to account for it, a Danubian origin for 
the Rhenish Sicambrians, with migrations to match, has been 
inferred. 

By the end of the first century, the name Sicambri has 
become of comparatively rare occurrence, and the very fact 
of its not appearing in the Germania, is a proof of the ex- 
tent to which its greatness has diminished. 

The Frank successors of Clovis, as well as Clovis himself, 
are often called Sicambri. In Gregory of Tours 1 account 
of the baptism of Clovis, the bishop says, — " Mitis depone 
colla, Sicamber t adora quod incendisti, incende quod ad- 
orasti.'' 1 

Again — 

Cum sis progenitus clara de gente Sj/gamber. 

Venantius Fortunatus to King Charibert. 

" In Sicambrorum natione rex nullus illi (n. Dagoberto) 
similis fuisse narraretur.'" — Vita S. Arnulphi. 

In all these cases, however, the term is a titular archaism ; 
no nation then being called Sicambrian. 

Like Cherusci, then, Sicambri is a term which occurs 
during the early period of the history of the population to 
which it applied only. 

Which of the two usual explanations of a fact of this 



EPILEGOMENA. ill 

kind must we take ; the extermination of the people, or the 
change of name ? 

The evidence in favour of the former view, is strong ; 
Tiberius — " Sicambros dedentes se traduxit in Galliam atque 
in proximis Rheno agris collocavit. ,, — Suet. Aug. 21. 

Again, — " Germanico (bello) quadraginta millia dedititi- 
orum trajecit in Galliam, juxtaque ripam Rheni sedibus as- 
signatis collocavit. 1 ' 1 — Idem, Tib. 9. 

Tiberius, speaking of himself, says, that, " Se novies a divo 
Augusto in Germaniam missum, plura consilio quam vi per- 
fecisse ; sic Sicambros in deditionem acceptos, sic Suevos." — 
Tac. Ann. ii. 26. 

A stronger expression still occurs in another place : — " Ut 
quondam Sicambri excisi, et in Gallias trajecti forent, ita 
Silurum nomen penitus extinguendum." — Ann. xii. 89. 

On the other hand, — 

a. The name Sicambri was probably Gallic, since we find 
it in Ceesar. Possibly, it was exclusively so ; in which case, 
the explanation is clear. It disappeared as soon as the Ger- 
mans, to which it applied, became known by their German 
designations. 

b. It was, perhaps, the collective name of a confederacy, 
consisting of Gugemi, Gambrivii, 3Iarsi, and others ; in 
which case it became obsolete when the confederacy was 
broken up. 

I do not profess to see my way clearly here ; or to be 
able to decide to even my own satisfaction. Neither can I ex- 
plain the relation between the names Si-cambri {§x\-gambri) 
and Gambr-Wn ; for I think it would be unsafe to consider 
it accidental. 

Besides this, there is a Gambara, conspicuous as a female 
leader, in the Langobard traditions. 

And, besides this, the Gimbri. 

And, besides this, the root h-mp =figM ; so that Jcampfer 
= fighting- man {champion) . 

The syllable si-, both Zeuss and Grimm consider to re- 
present the root sig = victoria ; and as gambar = strenuus, 
Si-gambri = Sig-gambri = strong for victory = sieg-ta- 
pfere. 

o 2 



IV THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

Without admitting this, I have nothing better to pro- 
pose; though, at times, I have thought that the si-, su-, 
or sy-, might = the su- in Sussex, and the #M-garnbri = 
South G-ambrians. 

At other times, it has looked like the 8-g, in the name of 
the river Sieg ; so that 8i-gambri = Gamhrians of the Sieg. 

However, as long as there are fair reasons for believing it to 
be no German word at all, such guess-work is gratuitous. 

The orthography of the name is varied. Although the 
i be short — 

" Tc caede °;audctites Slcambri, 

Compositis venerantur armis," 

the Greek form is 2ovyd/j£poi, with the diphthong, as in Stra- 
bo ; though 2vyafi€poi in most MSS. of Ptolemy. The 
best form, perhaps, is Sugambri. 

The locality of the Sicambri is that of the Franks of the 
Lower Rhine ; the question as to whether the Frank history 
be a continuation of the Sicambrian, or the history of 
another population on the same ground, being involved in 
the questions just noticed, viz. the extent to which the dis- 
appearance of the name was nominal or real ; referable to 
the extinction of the nation, or referable to the displacement 
of an old term by a new one ; explained by the influence of 
an army, or explained by the influence of a synonym. 

And this question stands open. 

2. The Gugerni of Tacitus, Guberni of Pliny. — The present 
town of Gellich indicates the exact locality of this population. 

In a document, a.d. 904, it has the form Geldapa. 
In Tacitus, it is the well-known locality Gelduba. — Hist. 
iv. 26, v. 16, 18. 

3. Tubantes. — " Chamavorum quondam ea arva, mox Tu- 
bantum, et post Usipiorum^ — Ann. xiii. 55. 

Along with this should be taken from the following chap- 
ter, the notice of the — 

4. Ampsi-varii. — "Sola Ampsivariorum gens retro ad Usi- 
pios et Tubantes concessit ; quorum terris exacti cum Chattos, 
dein Cheruscos petiissent, errore longo, hospites, egeni, hostes 
in alieno, quod juventutis erat, caeduntur. Imbellis eetas in 
preedam divisa est."" — Ibid. 56. 



EPILEGOMENA. V 

Now, the name of each of these populations gives their 
localities. 

a. Tu-bantes is the oldest form of the Dutch district 
Tw-ente, in Overijsel. 

b. Ampsi-varii — Emis-wcere, occupants of the (Upper) Ems. 
Both seem to have been on the Cherusco- Frisian frontier 

(perhaps as Marchmen), and, consequently, it is difficult to 
give them their exact ethnological position. 

That considerable displacement occurred in these parts is 
certain. The annihilation of the Ampsivarii is not so. 

The name re-appears in the fourth century — " Pauci ex 
Ampsivariis et Chattis, Marcomere duce, in ulterioribus 
collium jugis apparuere." — Sulpic. Alex. ap. Gregor. Turon. 
2, 9. 

The Ampsivarii of Tacitus are, almost certainly, the X//-- 
tyiavoi of Strabo. Whether they are also the Ka/uL-^riavot, of 
that writer is doubtful. — See Epilegomena. 

o. Caninefates. — The locality now called iTm-heim, and 
Ken-mere in North Holland, is considered to retain the root 
Can- of the compound form ; the power of the final elements 
being unknown, and the evidence of the word being a com- 
pound at all being, consequently, inconclusive. Such, how- 
ever, it probably is. 

The Caninefates are mentioned in Hist. iv. 15, 16, 18. 

They are closely connected with the Batavi ; a fact, which, 
as far as it goes, is in favour of that population being native 
rather than of Hessian origin. — See note in vv. Subatti, and 
§ Batti, in Epilegomena. 

A measure of the extent to which absolute and implicit faith 
is to be placed in each and every statement, of even so great 
a writer as Tacitus, is to found in his account of the Jews, 
whom he brings from Crete. Yet it was easier to write 
correctly about the Jews, than about the populations of 
Courland, Gallicia, and Poland. 

§ II. THE DEA TACFANA. 

A dea Tacfana, Tawfana, or Tamfana is mentioned as a 
local goddess of the Marsi. 



VI THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

No light has been thrown upon the nature of her cultus ; 
indeed, the mention of her is a strong instance of the extent 
to which the German mythology of Tacitus is not the 
mythology of Germany, in the seventh, eighth, ninth, tenth, 
and eleventh centuries. 



§ III. THE DEA HLUDANA. 

In Cleves, a stone with the following inscription was dug 
up, and preserved at Xanten, deae hludanae sacrum c. tibe- 
rius VERUS. 

Mutatis mutandis what applies to the dea Tacfana applies 
to the dea Illudana. 



$> IV. THE NOTICE OF GERMANY IN TTOLEMY. 

The German part of Ptolemy's geography is more truly a 
complement to the Germania of Tacitus, than any other 
work extant ; since two areas, but slightly noticed by the 
Latin writer, are given by the Greek one with a fair 
amount of detail. These are, — 

a. The country to the east of the Upper Rhine, wherein 
we find such new names as Nertereanes, Danduti, &c. =the 
Hermanduri of Suabia, Franconia, Baden, and Bavaria. 

b. The parts to the north of the Elbe, viz., Holstein, 
Sleswick, and Jutland, along with a portion of Scandinavia. 
This gives such names as Sigulones, Phundusii, &c. 

It is, perhaps, almost superfluous to add, that Ptolemy is 
the first author who mentions the Saxons by that name. 

As with Strabo, the names printed with their letters wider 
apart than usual, will be subjected to further notice in a 
special section (§). 

GERMAN. LIB. II. C XI. 

8. Kare-xpvai Se t?}? Yepp,avia<s to, fiev irapa rbv 'Vtjvov 
irorajMov apyop,kvoi<; air ap/crcov o'l re BovaaKrepoc oi fjuuicpoX 
Kal oi "2v<yap,§poi. 

9. 'Tcp' ov<i oi 2ovr}£oi Aa<yyo§dp8oi eira Tey/cepoi Kal 



EPILEGOMENA. vii 

"ly/cpicoves pbeTa^v re'PrjVov teal tcov 'ASvoSatcov opecov teal 
en, 'IvTovepyoi teal Ovapy leaves teal KaptrvoL 

10. 'T<£' ou? O vi enrol /cal ->) tcov "EXovrjTLcov eprjpbos 
p*&XP l r ™ v ^lpVI Jb ^ V(0V AXirlcov opecov. 

11. Tr)v he irapcotceavlTiv Kare^ovcriv VTrep pbev rov<; 
BovcraKTepov? ol (ppiacriot jJ>expt tov Apbacrlov nrorapLOV' 
fiSTa he tovtovs Kay^oi ol pu/cpol ftexP 1, rou Ovierovpybos 
7Tora/jiov' elra Kav^oi ol fiel^ov? p-e^pc tov "AXSlos ttotu- 
fiov' icpe^rjs he eirl tov at^era Trjs KipbSpiferjs Xepcrovrjcrov 
2a^oi/69* avrr)v he tt)v Xepcrovrjcrov vivep pbev TOt»9 2,d%ova<i 
2 iyovXcove<; citto hverpbcov, elra 2a&aXiyyt,o t, elra Ko- 
&avho L 

12. 'Tirep ov? XdXoi, ical ere virep tovtovs hvcrpbi/cco- 
repoi pbev <£>ovvhovcrot, dvaroXiteeoTepoi he Xapovhes, irdv- 
tcov he dpKTLKcbrepoL Kt/xSpoi. 

13. Merd Be toi»? 2<z£oj/a<? dtrb tov XaXovaov iroTapbov 
fjiexpi rov '2ovo]§ov iroTapbov <t>apohe lvo L 

14. E2t<x SeiScvol pe^pi rov ^lahova irorapbov, koX p,er 
avrovs ( VovTLK\eioi p^expi' tov OvierTovXa irorapbov. 

15. Tcov he evrbs teal pbeeroyelcov edvcov puey terra pbev 
cart to, re tcov IZovrj&cov tcov AyyeiXcov, ol elatv dvaTO- 
XttecoTepoi. tcov Aayyo§dpheov dvaTelvovres Trpb? Ta<? aptCTOV? 
/jtexpt tcov puecrcov tov 'A\£io? iroTapuov teal to tcov "Sovtj&eov 
tcov ^epbvovcov, oiTive? hirjKovai pueTa tov 'AX$bv dirb tov 
elprjpuevov pbipovs 7rpo? dvaToXd'i pbexpt TodlZovrjSov iroTapuov 
teal to tcov BovyovvTcov rd i<pe^f]<i teal p>expi tov OviaTovXa 
tcarexbvTcov. 

16. 'EXdcrcrova he Wvr) teal fiera^v teetVTai — Kav^cov 
fiev rcov pbitcpcov teal tcov ~2ov>']ocov BoverdtCTepoi, ol pbel&v; 
vcf)' ovs Xaifiat' Kair^wv he tcov puet^ovcov teal tcov '2ov)j§cov 
Ayyptovdpior 

17. Elra AayyoSdphor vcf ov? AovXyovpbvior 2afo- 
vcov he /cal twv 1,ovij§cov TevTOVodp(c)o i teal Ovipovvot, 
<$>apoheivcov he teal ^ovtj&cov Tcvto ves teal Avapiroi' 'Povtl- 
tcXelcov he teal Bovyovvrcov AlXovalcove^. 

18. YldXiv virb pbev tovs SeyLtvova? oltcovert ^tXtyyai, virb 
he Tovq BovyovvTa<; Aovy(i)oc ol ^Opuavvol, vtf> ov$ Aovy(i)oi 
ol Aovvoi pbeXP 1 T0V ^o-Kb^ovpylov opov;. 



Vlll THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

19. 'T7ro Be tou? 'SiXlyyas KaXovKcoves icp 1 eKarepa rov 
'AXv. '09 Trorajiov, vtf) oi><; XaipovaKol teal Xapcavol yue^pt 
rov ~Mt]\i£6kov opovs. 

20. P I2v 7rpo? dvaro\as irepl rov "AXGlv irorapbbv Baivo- 
yal^iai, virep ovs Bareivol, Kal ere inrep tovtov? vtto to 
'Aa/ciSovpyiO)' <"'po9 Kop/covrol Kal Aovy(i)ot ol Bovpot p-£%pi 

T>}9 K6(f)a\T]<i TOU OviCTTOvXa TTOTCI/jLOV. 

21. 'Ttto Be tovtovs irpwrot SiBcoves, elra Kcoyvoo, elra 
OviaSovpyLOt inrep rov 'OpKvviov Bpvp,6v. 

22. EIaX,iv air dvaro\6iv puev rcov \&vo&aicov opwv ol/cov- 
criv virep tov<$ 'Sovifiovs Kacrovdpoi, elra N eprepeave<; 
elra AavBovroi, ixft 0D9 Tovpcovot Kal Mapoviyyoi. 

23. 'Ttto Be toi>9 Xapuavovs Xdrrat, /ecu TovSavrot, Kal 
virep ra ^ovBrjra op?) Tevpio^alp,ai, vtto he to opt] Ova- 

plCTTOL. 

24. Elra rj YapL&pi'ira vXrj, Kal vtto puev rovg Mapovly- 
70U9 Ko vplco ves, elra Xairovcopoc, Kal P'^XP 1 T0V &.ctvov- 
clov irorap,ov ol Yl ap pbatKapbiro c. 

25. f T7ro Be ri]v Yap&ptfrav vXrjv MapKOfiavol, vcp' oi>9 
SovBtjvoI, Kal p>£XP L T0V ActvovSlov irorapoov ol ABpa- 

GaiKUpLTTOC. 

26. 'Ttto Be rov 'OpKvvtov Bpvpbbv KovdBot, v(ji ov<; ra 
o-iBripcopvxela Kal rj Aovva v\rj, vcf rjv p,eya edvos ol Balpbot 
pLexpo rov AavovGtov, Kal avvex^ avrol^ irepl rov irorapcov 
ol TepaKarp lat, Kal ol 777309 to?9 Kdp,iroi<$ 'YaKarat. 



§ V. EXTRACTS FROM JORNANDES DE REBUS GETICIS. 

Jornandes, an Ostro-G-oth by birth, was Bishop of Ravenna 
about a.d. 530. The following extracts are given, for the 
sake of showing the form which a mixture of tradition, 
speculation, and heterogeneous accounts of other populations, 
took in the hands of one of the first native Goths who 
attended to the antiquities of his nation. 

Having premised it was from the bosom of a northern 
island named Scanzia, that his countrymen came, like a 
swarm of bees, into Europe, and after a reference to Ptolemy 
he continues — 



EPILEGOMENA. IX 

In Scanzia vero insula, unde nobis sermo est, licet multse 
et diversse maneant nationes, septem tamen earum nomina 
meminit Ptolemaeus. In cujus parte aretoa gens Adogit 
consistit, quse fertur in sestate media quadraginta diebus et 
noctibus luces habere continuas; itemque brumali tempore, 
eodem dierum noctiumque numero lucem claram nescire. Ita 
alternato moerore cum gaudio, beneficio aliis damnoque impar 
est. Et hoc quare? Quia prolixioribus diebus solem ad 
orientem per axis margin em vident redeuntem : brevioribus 
rero non sic conspicitur apud illos, sed aliter ; quia Austrina 
signa percurrit, et qui nobis videtur sol ab imo surgere, illis 
per terra? marginem dicitur circuire. Alise vero ibi gentes 
Crefennse, qui frumentorum non queeritant victum : sed car- 
nibus ferarum atque avium vivunt. Ubi tanta paludibus 
fetura ponitur, ut et augmentum praestent generi, et satie- 
tatem ac copiam genti. Alia vero gens ibi moratur Suethans, 
quse velut Thuringi, equis utuntur eximiis. Hi quoque sunt, 
qui in usus Romanorum Saphirinas pelles commercio interve- 
niente per alias innumeras gentes transmittunt, famosi pellium 
decora nigredine. Hi quum inopes vivunt, ditissime vesti- 
untur. Sequuntur deinde diversarum turbae nationum, Theu- 
sthes, Vagoth, Bergio, Hallin, Liothida, quorum omnium 
sedes sub humo plana ac fertili, et propterea inibi aliarum 
gentium incursionibus infestantur. Post hos Athelnil, Fin- 
naithse, Fervir, Gautigoth, acre hominum genus, et ad bella 
promptissimum. Dehinc mixti Evagerae Othingis. Hi omnes 
exesis rupibus, quasi castellis inhabitant, ritu beluino. Sunt 
ex his exteriores Ostrogothae, Raumaricae, Raugnaricii, Finni 
mitissimi, Scanziae cultoribus omnibus mitiores : necnon et 
pares eorum Vinoviloth, Suethidi, Cogeni in hac gente reli- 
quis corpore eminentiores, quamvis et Dani ex ipsorum stirpe 
progressi, Erulos propriis sedibus expulerunt : qui inter omnes 
Scanzise nationes nomen sibi ob nimiam proceritatem affectant 
prsecipuum. Sunt quanquam et illorum positura Grannii, 
Aganzise, Unixse, Ethelrugi, Arochiranni, quibus non ante 
omnes, sed ante multos annos Rodulf rex fuit : qui contempto 
proprio regno, ad Theoderici Gothorum regis gremium convo- 
lavit, et ut desiderabat, invenit. Hae itaque gentes Romanis 
corpore et amnio grandiores, infesta? saavitia pugnae. 



X THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

Ex hac igitur Scanzia insula, quasi officina gentium, aut 
eerte velut vagina nationum, cum rege suo nomine Berich 
Gothi quondam memorantur egressi : qui ut primum e navibus 
exeuntes terras attigere, illico loco nomen detlerunt. Nam 
hodie illic, ut fertur, Gothiscanzia vocatur. Unde mox pro- 
moventes ad sedes Ulmerugorum, qui tunc Oceani ripas insi- 
debant, castrametati sunt, eosque commisso proelio propriis 
sedibus pepulerunt : eorumque vicinos Wandalos jam tunc 
subjugantes, suis applicuere victoriis. Ibi vero magna populi 
nvimerositate crescente, etiam pene quinto rege regnante, post 
Berich, Filimer, filio Godarici, consilio sedit, ut exinde cum 
familiis Gothorum promoveret exercitus. Qui aptissimas sedes, 
locaque dum qutereret congrua, pervenit ad Scythise terras, 
quse lingua coram Ouin vocabantur. Ubi delectato magna 
ubertate regionum exercitu, et medietate transposita, pons 
dicitur, unde amnem transjecerat, miserabiliter corruisse, nee 
ulterius jam cuiquam licuit ire, aut redire. Nam is locus, ut 
fertur, tremulis paludibus voragine circumjecta coucluditur: 
quem utraque confusione natura reddidit impervium. Verun- 
tamen bodieque illic et voces armentorum audiri, et indicia 
hominum deprehendi, commeantium adtestatione, quamvis a 
longe audientium, credere licet. Hsee igitur pars Gothorum, 
quse apud Filimer dicitur in terras Ouin emenso amne trans- 
posita, optatum potita solum : nee mora : illico ad gentem 
Spalorum adveniunt, consertoque proelio victoriam adipi- 
scuntur. Exindeque jam velut victores ad extremam Scythise 
partem, quse Pontico mari vicina est, properant : quemad- 
modum et in priscis eorum carminibus pene historico ritu in 
commune recolitur : quod et Ablavius descriptor Gothorum 
gentis egregius verissima adtestatur historia. In quam sen- 
tentiam et nonnulli consensere majorum. Josephus quoque 
annalium relator verissimus, dum ubique veritatis conservat 
regulam, et origines causarum a principio revolvit, hsec vero, 
quae diximus, de gente Gothorum principia cur omiserit, igno- 
ramus. Sed tamen ab hoc loco eorum stirpem commemorans, 
Scythas eos et natione et vocabulo asserit appellatos : cujus 
soli terminos, antequam aliud ad medium deducamus, necesse 
est, uti jaceant, dicere. 

Scythia siquidem Germanise terrse confinis, eotenus ubi 



EPILEGOMENA. XI 

Hister oritur amnis, vel stagnum dilatatur Mysianum, tendens 
usque ad flumina Tyrani, Danastrum, et Vagosolam, ma- 
gnumque ilium Danubium, Taurumque montem, non ilium 
Asiae, sed proprium, id est Scythicum, per omnem Maeotidis 
ambitum, ultraque Maeotida, per angustias Bospori usque ad 
Oaucasum montem, amnemque Araxem : ac deinde in sini- 
stram partem reflexa, post mare Caspium, qua? in extremis 
Asise finibus ab Oceano Euroboreo, in modum fungi primum 
tenuis, post haec latissima et rotunda forma exoritur, vergens 
ad Hunnos, Albanos, et Seres usque digreditur. Hsec inquam 
patria, id est Scythia, longe se tendens, lateque aperiens, 
habet ab oriente Seres, in ipso sui principio ad litus Oaspii 
maris commanantes ; ab occidente Germanos, et flumen Vi- 
stula? ; ab arctoo, id est septentrionali, circumdatur Oceano : 
a meridie Perside, Albania, Hiberia, Ponto, atque extremo 
alveo Histri, qui dicitur Danubius, ab ostio suo usque ad 
fontem. In eo vero loci latere, quo Ponticum litus attingit, 
oppidis baud obscuris involvitur, Boristhenide, Olbia, Calli- 
pode, Chersone, Theodosio, Pareone, Mirmycione, et Trape- 
zunte : quas indomitee Scytharum nationes Grsecos permisere 
condere, sibimet commercia praestaturos. In cujus Scythiae 
medio est locus, qui Asiam Europamque ab alterutro dividit. 
Riphaei scilicet monies, qui Tana'in vastissimum fundunt in- 
trantem Mseotida ; cujus paludis circuitus passuum millia 
cxliiii, nusquam octo ulnis altius subsidentis. In qua Scythia 
prima ab occidente gens sedit Gepidarum, quae magnis opina- 
tisque ambitur fluminibus. Nam Tisianus per aquilonem ejus 
corumque discurrit. Ab Africo vero magnus ipse Danu- 
bius, ab euro fluvius Tausis secat : qui rapidus ac verticosus 
in Histri fluenta furens devolvitur. Introrsus illi Dacia est, 
ad coronae speciem arduis Alpibus emunita : juxta quorum 
sinistrum latus, quod in aquilonem vergit, et ab ortu Vistula? 
numinis per immensa spatia venit, Winidarum natio populosa 
consedit. Quorum nomina licet nunc per varias familias et 
loca mutentur, principaliter tamen Sclavini et Antes nomi- 
nantur. Sclavini a civitate nova, et Sclavino Rumunnense, et 
lacu qui appellatur Musianus, usque ad Danastrum, et in bo- 
ream Viscla tenus commorantur : hi paludes sylvasque pro 
civitatibus habent. Antes vero, qui sunt eorum fortissimi, 



Xll THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

qui ad Ponticum mare curvantur, a Danastro extenduntur 
usque ad Danubium : quae flumina multis mansionibus ab 
invicem absunt. Ad litus autem Oeeaui, ubi tribus faucibus 
fluenta Vistulse fluminis ebibuntur, Vidioarii resident, ex di- 
versis nationibus aggregati. Post quos ripam Oceani Itemesti 
tenent, pacatum hominum genus omnino. Quibus in austro 
adsedit gens Agazzirorum fortissima, frugurn ignara, qua3 
pecoribus et venationibus victitat. Ultra quos distenduntur 
supra mare Ponticum Bulgarorum sedes, quos notissimos pec- 
catorum nostrorum mala fecere. Hinc jam Hunni, quasi 
fortissimarum gentium foecundissimus cespes, in bifariam popu- 
lorum rabiem pullularunt. Nam alii Aulziagri, alii Auiri 
nuncupantur, qui tamen sedes babent diversas. Juxta Clier- 
sonem Aulziagri, quo Asia? bona avidus mercator importat, 
qui aestate campos pervagantur eftusos, sedes liabentes, prout 
armentorum invitaverint pabula ; hyeme supra mare Ponti- 
cum so referentes. Hunugari autem bine sunt noti, quia ab 
ipsis pellium murinarum venit commercium : quos tantorum 
virorum Pormidavit audacia. Quorum mansionem primam 
esse in Scythise solo, juxta paludem Ma;otidem, secundo in 
Moesia, Thraciaque, et Dacia, tertio supra mare Ponticum, 
rursus in Scythia legimus habitasse : nee eorum fabulas ali- 
cubi reperimus scriptas, qui eos dicunt in Britannia, vel in una 
qualibet insularum in servitutem redactos, et unius caballi 
pretio quondam redemptos. Aut certe si quis eos aliter di- 
xerit in nostro orbe, quam quod nos diximus, fuisse exortos, 
nobis aliquid obstrepit : nos enim potius lectioni credimus, 
quam fabulis anilibus consentimus. Ut ergo ad nostrum pro- 
positum redeamus, in prima parte Scythia? juxta Mseotidem 
commanentes prsefati, unde loquimur, Filimer regem habuisse 
noscuntur. In secundo, id est, Dacia?, Thraciseque et Mcesiae 
solo Zamolxen, quern mirse pliilosopbicse eruditionis fuisse 
testantur plerique scriptores annalium. Nam et Zeutam prius 
habuerunt eruditum, post etiam Diceneum, tertium Zamolxen, 
de quo superius diximus. Nee defuerunt, qui eos sapientiam 
erudirent. Unde et pene omnibus barbaris Gothi sapientiores 
semper extiterunt, Grsecisque pene consimiles, ut refert Dio, 
qui historias eorum annalesque Grseco stilo composuit. Qui 
dixit primum Tarabosteos, deinde vocitatos Pileatos bos, qui 



EPILEGOMENA. Xlll 

inter eos generosi extabant ; ex quibus eis et reges, et sacer- 
dotes ordinabantur. Adeo ergo fuere laudati Getse, ut dudum 
Martem, quern poetarum fallacia deum belli pronunciat, apucl 
eos fuisse dicant exortum. Unde et Virgilius, 

"Gradivumque patrem, Geticis qui prsesidet arvis." 

Quem Martem Gothi semper asperrima placavere cultura. 
Nam victimse ejus mortes fuere captorum, opinantes bellorum 
preesulem aptius humani sanguinis efFusione placandnm. Huic 
prsedse primordia vovebantur, huic truncis suspendebantur ex- 
uviee : eratque illis religionis prseter cseteros insinuatus aife- 
ctus, quum parenti devotio nominis videretur impendi. Tertia 
vero sedes supra mare Ponticum. Jam humaniores, et, ut 
superins diximus, prudentiores effecti, divisi per familias 
populi, Wesegothse familiee Balthorum, Ostrogothse prgeclaris 
Amalis serviebant. Quorum studium fait primnm, inter alias 
gentes vicinas, arcus intendere nervis ; Lucano, plus historico 
quam poeta, testante, 

K Armeniosque arcus Geticis intendere nervis." 

Ante quos etiam cantu majorum facta modulationibus citha- 
risque canebant, Ethespamarse, Hanalse, Fridigerni, Widi- 
cula3, et aliorum, quorum in hac gente magna opinio est, 
quales vix heroas fuisse miranda jactat antiquitas. Tunc, ut 
fertur, Vesoces Scythis lachrymabile sibi potius intulit bellum, 
eis videlicet, quos Amazonum viros prisca tradit auctoritas. 
De queis feminas bellatrices et Orosius in primo volumine pro- 
fessa voce testatur. Unde cum Gothis eum dimicasse evi- 
denter probamus, quem cum Amazonum viris absolute pu- 
gnasse cognoscimus : qui tunc a Boristbene amne, quem accola? 
Danubium vocant, usque ad Tanain fluvium, circa sinum palu- 
dis MaBotidis considebant. Tanain vero hunc dico, qui ex 
Ripheis montibus dejectus adeo prseceps ruit, ut quum vicina 
flumina, sive Meeotis, vel Bosporus gelu solidentur, solus 
amnium confragosis montibus vaporatus, nunquam Scythico 
durescit algore. Hie inter Asiam Europamque terminus fa- 
mosus habetur : nam alter est ille, qui montibus Chrinnorum 
oriens, in Caspium mare dilabitur. Danubius autem ortus 
grandi palude, quasi ex mari profunditur. Hie usque ad 



XIV THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

medium sui dulcis est et potabilis, piscesque nimii saporis 
gignit, ossibus carentes, cartilagiuem tantum habentes in cor- 
poris continentiam. Sed ubi fit Ponto vicinior, parvum 
fontem suseipit, cui* ex Amplieo cognomen est, adeo amarum, 
ut cum sit xl. dierum itinere navigabilis, hujus aquis exiguis 
immutetur, infestusque ac dissimilis sui, inter Groeca oppida 
Callipidas et Hipanis, in mare defluat. Ad cnjus ostia insula 
est in fronte, A chillis nomine. Inter hos terra vastissima, 
silvis consita, paludibus dubia. 

Hie ergo Gothis morantibus, Vesoces iEgyptiorum rex 
in bellum irruit : quibus tunc Taunasis rex erat. Quo proelio 
ad Phasim fluvium, a quo Phasides aves exortse, in toto 
mundo eduliis potentum exuberant, Taunasis Gothorum rex 
Vesoci ^Egyptiorum occurrit, eumque graviter debellans, in 
iEgyptum usque persecutus est : et nisi Nili amnis intrans- 
meabilis obstitissent fluenta, vel munitiones, quas dudum sibi, 
ob incursiones iEthiopum Vesocis fieri prsecepisset, ibi in ejus 
cum patria extinxisset. Sed dum eum semper ibi positum 
non valuisset laedere, revertens pene omnem Asiam subjugavit, 
et sibi tunc caro amico Sorno rege Medorum ad persolven- 
dum tributum, subditum fecit. Ex cujus exercitu victores 
tunc nonnulli provincias subditas contuentes, et in omni ferti- 
litate pollentes, deserto suorum agmine sponte in Asiee par- 
tibus resederunt. Ex quorum nomine vel genere Trogus 
Pompeius Parthorum dicit extitisse prosapiam. Unde etiam 
hodieque lingua Scythica fugaces, quod est Parthi, dicuntur : 
suoque generi respondentes, inter omnes pene Asiee nationes 
soli sagittarii sunt, et acerrimi bellatores. De nomine vero, 
quod diximus eos Parthos, id est fugaces, ita aliquanti etymo- 
logiam traxerunt, ut dicerentur Parthi, quia suos refugere 
parentes. Hunc ergo Taunasim regem Gothorum mortuum 
inter numina sui populi coluerunt. 

Post cujus decessum exercitu ejus cum snecessore ipsius 
in aliis partibus expeditionem gerente, feminse Gothorum a 
quadam vicina gente tentatse, in prsedamque ducta? a viris, 
fortiter restiterunt, hostesque super se venientes cum magna 
verecundia abegerunt. Qua parata victoria, fretseque majori 
audacia, invicem se cohortantes, arma arripiunt, eligentesque 
* Compare Herodotus, iv. 52. 



EPILEGOMENA. XV 

duas audaciores Lampeto* et Marpesiam principatui subroga- 
runt. Quae dura curam gerunt, tit propria defenderent, et 
aliena vastarent, sortito Lampeto restitit, fines patrios tuendo. 
Marpesia vero feminarum agrnine sumpto, novum genus exer- 
citus duxit in Asiam, diversasque gentes bello superans, alias 
vero pace concilians, ad Oaucasum venit : ibique certum tempus 
demorans, loco nomen dedit, Saxum Marpesise. Unde Virgilius, 

" Quam si dura silex aut stet Marpesia cautes." 

In eo loco ubi post beec Alexander Magnus portas constituens, 
Pylas Caspias nominavit : quod nunc Lazorum gens custodit 
pro munitione Eomana. Hie ergo certum temporis Amazones 
commanentes confortatse sunt. Unde egressse, et Alym flu- 
vium, qui juxta Gargarum civitatem prseterfluit, transeuntes, 
Armeniam, Syriam, Ciliciamque, Galatiam, Pisidiam, omni- 
aque Asise oppida, sequa felicitate domuerunt : Ionium, ^Eoli- 
amque conversse, deditas sibi provincias effecerunt. Ubi 
diutius dominantes, etiam civitates castraque suo nomini dica- 
verunt. Ephesi quoque templum Diansc, ob sagittandi venan- 
dique studium, quibus se artibus tradidissent, effusis opibus, 
mirse pulcbritudinis condiderunt. Tali ergo Seythicae gentis 
feminse casu Asise regno potitae, per centum pene annos tenue- 
runt, et sic demum ad proprias socias in cautes Marpesias, 
quas superius diximus, repedarunt, in montem scilicet Oau- 
casum. Oujus montis, quia facta iterum mentio est, non ab re 
arbitror ejus tractum situmque describere, quando maximam 
partem orbis noscitur circuire jugo continuo. Caucasus ab 
Indico mari surgens, qua meridiem respicit, sole vaporatus 
ardescit. Qua septentrioni patet, rigentibus ventis est ob- 
noxius et pruinis. Mox in Syriam curvato angulo reflexus, 
licet amnium plurimos emittat, in Asianam tamen regionem 
Eufratem Tigrimque navigeros. ad opinionem maximam per- 
ennium fontium, copiosis fundit uberibus. Qui amplexantes 
terras Assyriorum, Mesopotamiam appellari faciunt, et videri ; 
in sinum maris Rubri fluenta deponentes. Tunc in boream 
revertens, Scythias terras, jugum antefatum magnis flexibus 
pervagatur: atque ibidem opinatissima flumina in Oaspium 
mare profundens, Araxem, Oyssum, et Oambysen, continuato 
* This is the name of one of the viragoes of the Lysislrala. 



XVI THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

jugo ad Ripheos usque montes extenditur. Indeque Scy- 
thicis gentibus dorso suo terminum pra3beus, ad Poiitum usque 
descendit : consertisque collibus, Histri quoque fluenta con- 
tingit, quo amnis scissus debisceus, in Scytbia quoque Taurus 
vocatur. Talis ergo tantusque, et pene omnium maximus, 
excelsas suas erigens summitates, natural i constructioni pra> 
stat gentibus inexpugnanda munimina. Nam locatim rescisus, 
qua disrupto jugo vallis hiatu patescit, nunc Caspias portas, 
nunc Armenias, nunc Cilicas, vel secundum locum qualis 
fuerit, facit ; vix tamen plaustro meabilis, lateribus in altitu- 
dinem utrimque directis, qui pro gentium varietate diverso 
vocabulo nuncupatur. Hunc enim Iamnium, mox Propanismum 
Indus appellat. Partlius primum Castra, post Nifacen edicit. 
Syrus et Armenius Taurum ; Scythse Caucasum ac Ripheum, 
iterumque in fine Taurum cognominant : aliaque complura 
gentes huicjugo dedere vocabula. Et quia de ejus continuatione 
pauca libavimus, ad Amazones, unde divertimus, redeamus. 

Verita? hse, ne earum proles raresceret, a vicinis gentibus 
concubitum petierunt ; facta nundina semel in anno, ita ut 
futuris temporibus eis deinde revertentibus in idipsum, quic- 
quid partus masculini edidisset, patri redderet : quicquid vero 
feminei sexus nasceretur, mater ad arma bellica erudiret. 
Sive, ut quibusdam placet, editis maribus, novercali odio in- 
fantis miserandi fata rumpebant : ita apud illas detestabile 
puerperium erat, quod ubique constat esse votivum. Quae 
crudelitas illis terrorem magnum cumulabat, opinione vulgata. 
Nam qua?, rogo, spes esset capto, ubi ignosci vel filio nefas 
habebatur ? Contra has, ut fertur, pugnabat Hercules ; et 
Melanes pene plus dolo, quam virtute subegit. Theseus vero 
Hippoliten in prsedam tulit, de qua genuit et Hippolytum. 
Hse quoque Amazones post hsec habuere reginam nomine Pen- 
thesileam, cujus Trojano bello extant clarissima documenta. 
Nam hse feminse usque ad Alexandrum Magnum referuntur 
tenuisse regnum. 

Sed ne dicas, de viris Gothorum sermo adsumptus, cur in 
feminis tamdiu perseveret : audi et virorum insignem et lau- 
dabilem et fortitudinem. Dio historicus, et antiquitatum dili- 
gentissimus inquisitor, qui operi suo Getica titulum dedit 
(quos Getas jam superiori loco Gothos esse probavimus, 



EPILEGOMENA. XV11 

Orosio Paulo clicente); hie Dio regem illis post tempora multa 
commemorat, nomine Telephum. Ne vero quis dicat hoc 
nomen a lingua Gothica omnino peregrinum esse, nemo est 
qui nesciat animadverti, usu pleraque nomina gentes amplecti, 
ut Romani Macedonum, Grseci Romanorum, Sarmatee Ger- 
manorum, Gothi plerumque mutuantur Hunnorum. Is ergo 
Telephus Herculis filius, natus ex Auge sorore Priami, con- 
jugio copulatus, procerus quidem corpore, sed plus vigore 
terribilis, paternam fortitudinem propriis virtutibus sequans, 
Herculis genio formse quoque similitudinem referebat. Hujus 
itaque regnum Moesiam appellavere majores. Quse provincia 
ab oriente ostia fluminis Danubii, a meridie Macedoniam, ab 
occasu Histriam, a septentrione Danubium habet. Is ergo 
antefatus habuit bellum cum Danais, in qua pugna Thessan- 
drum ducem GrEecige interemit ; et dum Ajacem infestus 
invadit, Ulyssemque persequitur, equo cadente, ipse corruit, 
Achillisque jaculo femore sauciatus, diu mederi nequivit : 
Grsecos tamen, quamvis jam saucius, e suis finibus proturbavit. 
Telepho vero defuncto, Eurypilus filius successit in regno, ex 
Priami Phrygum regis germana progenitus. Qui ob Oassan- 
drse amorem bello interesse Trojano, ac parentibus soceroque 
ferre auxilium cupiens, mox ut venit extinctus est. 

Cyrus rex Persarum post grande intervallum, et pene 
post sexcentorum triginta annorum tempora, Pompeio Trogo 
testante, Getarum reginee Tamiri, sibi exitiale, intulit bellum. 
Qui elatus ex Asia? victoria, Getas nititur subjugare ; in qui- 
bus (ut diximus) regnaverat Tamiris. Quse cum ab Araxe 
amne Cyri arcere potuisset accessus, transire tamen permisit, 
eligens armis eum vincere, quam locorum beneficio submovere : 
quod et factum est. Et veniente Cyro, prima cessit fortuna 
Parthis tanta, ut et filium Tamiris, et plurimum exercitum 
trucidarent. Sed iterato Marte, Getee cum sua regina Par- 
thos devictos superant atque prosteruunt, opimamque prsedam 
de eis auferunt : ibique primum Gothorum gens serica vident 
tentoria. Tunc Tamiris regina nacta victoria, tantaque 
prseda de inimicis potita, in partem Moesise (qua? nunc ex 
magna Scythia nomen mutuata, minor Scythia est appellata) 
transiens, ibi in ponte Mcesise colitur, et Tamiris civitatem 
suo de nomine sedificavit. Dehinc Darius rex Persarum, 



XV111 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

Hystaspis filius, Antyri regis Gothorum filiam in matrimonium 
expostulavit, rogans paritcr atque deterrens, nisi suam pera- 
gerent voluntatem. Cujus affinitatem Gothi spernentes, lega- 
tionem ejus frustrarunt. Qui repulsus, furore flammatus est,' 
et octoginta millia armatorum contra ipsos produxit exercitum, 
vereeundiam suam malo publico vindicare contendens ; navi- 
busque pcne a Chalccdonia usque ad Byzantium, ad instar 
pontium tabulatis atque consertis, petit Thraciam et Mcesiam ; 
ponteque rursus in Danubio pari modo constructo duobus 
mensibus crebris fatigatus intaphis, octo millia perdidit arma- 
torum. Timensque ne pons Danubii ab ejus adversariis oe- 
cuparetur, celeri fuga in Thraciam repedavit : nee Moesia? 
solum credens sibi tutum fore aliquantum remorandi. Post 
cujus decessum iterum Xerxes filius ejus paternas injurias 
ulcisci se sestimans, cum suis ducentis, et auxiliatorum tre- 
centis millibus armatorum, rostratas naves habens mille septin- 
gentas, et onerarias tria millia, super Gothos profectus ad bel- 
lum ; nee tcntata re in conrlictu prsevaluit, animositate 
constantise superatus. Sic namque ut venerat, absque aliquo 
certamine suo cum rubore recessit. Philippus quoque pater 
Alexandri Magni cum Gothis amicitias copulans, Medopam 
Gothilse filiam regis accepit uxorem, ut tali aflinitate roboratus, 
Macedonum regna firmaret. Qua tempestate, Dione historico 
dicente, Philippus inopiam pecunise passus, Udisitanam Moe- 
siae civitatem instructis copiis vastare deliberat, qua3 tunc 
propter viciniam Tamiris, Gothis erat subjecta. Unde et 
sacerdotes Gothorum aliqui, illi qui Pii vocabantur, subito 
patefactis portis cum citharis et vestibus candidis obviam sunt 
egressi paternis diis, ut sibi propitii Macedones repellerent, 
voce supplici modulantes. Quos Macedones sic fiducialiter 
sibi occurrere contuentes, stupescunt ; et si dici fas est, ab 
mermibus tenentur armati. Nee mora, acie soluta, quam ad 
bellum construxerunt, non tantum ab urbis excidio removere ; 
verum etiam et quos foris fuerunt jure belli adepti, reddide- 
runt, foedereque inito ad sua reversi sunt. Quern dolum post 
longum tempus reminiscens egregius Gothorum ductor Si- 
talcus, cl. virorum millibus congregatis, Atheniensibus intulit 
bellum, adversus Perdiccam Macedonia? regem, quern Alex- 
ander apud Babyloniam ministri insidiis potans interitum, 



EPILEGOMENA. XIX 

Atheniensium principatui hereditario jure reliquerat succes- 
sorem. Magno prselio cum hoc inito, Gothi superiores inventi 
sunt : et sic pro injuria, quam illi in Moesia dudum fecissent, 
isti in Grseciam discurrentes, cunctani Macedoniam vastavere. 

* * * * * 

Turn Gothi haud segnes reperti, arnia capessunt, primo- 
que armati conflictu mox Romanos devincunt : Fuscoque 
duce extincto, divitias de castris militum despoliant, magna- 
que potiti per loca victoria, jam proceres suos quasi qui fortuna 
vincebant, non puros homines, sed semideos, id est Anses 
vocavere. Quorum genealogiam paucis percurram ; ut quo 
quis parente genitus est, aut unde origo accepta, ubi finem 
efficit, absque invidia qui legis, vera dicentem ausculta. 

Horum ergo (ut ipsi suis fabulis ferunt) primus fuit Gapt, 
qui genuit Halmal ; Halmal vero genuit Augis ; Augis genuit 
eum, qui dictus est Amala, a quo et origo Amalorum decurrit. 
Et Amala genuit Isarnam ; Isarna autem genuit Ostrogo- 
tham ; Ostrogotha genuit Unilt ; Unilt genuit Athal ; Athal 
genuit Achiulf ; Achiulf genuit Ansilam et Ediulf, Vuldulf, et 
Hermenrich ; Vuldulf vero genuit Valeravans ; Valeravans 
autem genuit Winitharium ; Winitharius quoque genuit 
Theodemir et Walemir et Widemir; Theodemir genuit 
Theodericum ; Theodericus genuit Amalasuentam ; Amala- 
suenta genuit Athalaricum et Mathasuentam, de Widerico 
viro suo, cujus affinitati generis sic ad earn conjunctus est. 
Nam supradictus Hermenricus, filius Achiulfi, genuit Hunni- 
mundum ; Hunnimundus autem genuit Thorismundum ; Tho- 
rismundus vero genuit Berimundum ; Berimundus genuit Wi- 
dericum ; Widericus genuit Eutharicum ; qui conjunctus 
Ainalasuentee genuit Athalaricum et Mathasuentam ; mor- 
tuoque in puerilibus annis Athalarico, Mathasuentse Witichis 
est sociatus, de quo non suscepit liberum : adductique simul a 
Belisario in Constantinopolim, et Witichi rebus excedente 
humanis, Germanus patricius, fratruelis domini Justiniani Im- 
peratoris, eandem in conjugio sumens, patriciam ordinariam 
fecit ; de qua filium genuit, item Germanum nomine. Ger- 
mano vero defuncto, ipsa vidua perseverare disponit. Qualiter 
autem, aut quomodo Amalorum regnum destructum est, loco 
suo (si Dominus voluerit) edocebimus. Nunc autem ad id, 

p2 



XX THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

uncle digressum fecimus, redeamus, doceamusque quando 
ordo gentis, nnde agimus, eursus sui metam expleverit. Abla- 
vius enim historicus refert, quia ibi super limbum Ponti, ubi 
eos diximus in Scythia eommanere, pars eorum, qui orien- 
talem plagam tenebant, eisque procerat Ostrogotlia (incertum 
utrum ab ipsius nomine, an a loco orientali) clicti sunt Ostro- 
gotlia?, residui vero Wesegothae in parte occidua. Et quidem 
jam diximus, eos transito Danubio aliquantum temporis apud 
Mossiam, Thraciamque vixisse. 

Ab hinc ergo, ut dicebamus, post longam obsidionem ac- 

cepto praemio ditatus Geta, recessit ad patriam. Quem Gepi- 

darum cernens natio subito ubique vincentem, prsedisque 

ditatum, invidia ductus, arma in parentes movet. Quomodo 

vero Geta? Gepidseque sint parentes si quseris, paucis absol- 

vam. Meminisse debes, me initio de Scanziee insula? gremio 

Gothos dixisse egressos cum Berich suo rege, tribus tantum 

navibus vectos ad citerioris Oceani ripam ; quarum trium una 

navis. ut assolet, tardius vecta, nomen genti fertur dedisse ; 

nam lingua eorum pigra Gepanta dicitur. Hinc factum est, 

ut paullatim et corrupte nomen eis ex convitio nasceretur. 

Gepidse namque sine dubio ex Gothorum prosapia ducunt ori- 

ginem : sed quia, ut dixi, Gepanta pigrum aliquid tardumque 

signat, pro gTatuito convitio Gepidarum nomen exortum est, 

quod nee ipsum ; credo falsissimum. Sunt enim tardioris 

ingenii, graviores corporum velocitate. Hi ergo Gepidse tacti 

invidia, dudum spreta provincia, commanebant in insula 

Visclse amnis vadis circumacta, quam pro patrio sermone 

dicebant Gepidos. Nunc earn, ut fertur, insulam gens Vivi- 

daria incolit, ipsis ad meliores terras meantibus. Qui Vivi- 

darii ex diversis nationibus acsi in unum asylum collecti sunt, 

et gentem fecisse noscuntur. 

* % -A % * 

Gothorum rege Geberich rebus excedente humanis, post 
temporis aliquod Hermanricus nobilissimus Amalorum, in 
regno successit : qui multas et bellicosissimas arctoas gentes 
perdomuit, suisque parere legibus fecit. Quem merito non- 
nulli Alexandro Magno comparavere majores. Habebat siqui- 
clem quos domuerat, Gothos, Scythas, Thuidos, Inaunxis, 



EPILEGOMENA. XXI 

Vasinabroncas, Merens, Mordensimnis, Caris, Rocas, Tadzans, 
Athual, Navego, Bubegentas, Coldas ; et cum tantorum ser- 
vitio carus haberetur, non passus est nisi et gentem Heru- 
lorura, quibus prseerat Alaricus, magna ex parte trucidatam, 
reliquam sua? subigeret ditioni. Nam prsedicta gens (Ablavio 
historico referente) juxta Masotidas paludes habitans in locis 
stagnantibus, quas Grseci Hele vocant, Heruli nominati sunt : 
gens quanto velox, eo amplius superbissima. Nulla siquidem 
erat tunc gens, quae non levem armaturam in acie sua ex ipsis 
elegerint. Sed quamvis velocitas eorum ab aliis ssepe bellan- 
tibus eos tutaretur, Gotborum tamen stabilitati subjacuit et 
tarditati : fecitque causa fortunee, ut et ipsi inter reliquas 
gentes Getarum regi Hermanrico servierint. Post Herulorum 
csedam idem Hermanricus in Venetos arma commovit ; qui 
quamvis armis desperiti, sed numerositate pollentes, primo 
resistere conabantur. Sed nihil valet multitudo in bello, prse- 
sertim ubi et Deus permittit, et multitudo fortium armata 
advenerit. Nam hi, ut initio expositionis, vel catalogo gentis 
clicere coepimus, ab una stirpe exorti tria nunc nomina reddi- 
dere, id est Veneti, Antes, Sclavi : qui quamvis nunc ita faci- 
entibus peccatis nostris ubique desseviunt, tamen tunc omnes 
Hermanrici imperiis serviere. Hsestorum quoque similiter 
nationem, qui longissimam ripam Oceani Germanici insident, 
idem ipse prudentia virtute subegit, omnibusque Scythise et 
Germanise nationibus, acsi propriis laboribus, imperavit. 

Post autem non longi temporis intervallum, ut refert Oro- 
sius, Hunnorum gens omni ferocitate atrocior exarsit in 
Gothos : eosque qui prius timori erant ceeteris gentibus, ab 
antiquis conterritos pepulit sedibus. Nam hos, ut refert anti- 
quitas, ita extitisse comperimus. Filimer rex Gothorum, et 
Gandarici magni filius, post egressum Scanziaa insula? jam 
quinto loco tenens principatum Getarum, qui et terras Scy- 
thicas cum sua gente introisset, sicut a nobis dictum est, 
repperit in populo suo quasdam magas mulieres, quas patrio 
sermon e Alyrumnas is ipse cognominat, easque habens su- 
spectas de medio sui proturbat, longeque ab exercitu suo 
fugatas in solitudine coegit errare. Quas silvestres homines, 
quos Faunos Ficarios vocant, per eremum vagantes dum 
vidissent, et earum se complexibus in coitu miscuissent, genus 



XX11 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

hoe ferocissimum eclidere ; quod fuit primum inter paludes 
Mseotidas minutum, fcetrum, atque exile, quasi inhumanum 
genus, nee alia voce notum, nisi quod humani sermonis ima- 
ginem assignabat. Tali ergo Hunni stirpe creati, Gothorum 
finibus advenere. Quorum natio sseva, ut priscus historicus 
refert, in Mceotide palude ulteriorem ripam insedit: venatione 
tantum, nee alio labore experta, nisi quod postquam crevisset 
in populos, fraudibus et rapinis vicinam gentem conturbavit. 
Hujus ergo (ut assolent) venatores, dum in ulteriori Mceotidis 
ripa venationes inquirunt, animadvertunt quomodo ex impro- 
viso cerva se illis obtulit, ingressaque palude nunc progre- 
diens, nunc subsistens, indicem se vise tribuit. Quam secuti 
venatores, paludem Ma^otidein, quam imperviam ut pelagus 
existimabant, pedibus transiere. Mox quoque ut Scythica 
terra ignotis apparuit, cerva disparuit. Quod credo spiritus 
illi, unde progeniem trahunt, ad Scytharum invidiam egere. 
llli vero, qui prseter JMreotidem paludem alium mundum esse 
penitus ignorabant, admiratione inducti terras Scythioe, et ut 
sunt solertes, iter illud hulli ante banc setatem notissimum, 
divinitus sibi ostensum rati, ad suos redeunt, rei gestum 
edicunt, Scythiam laudant, persuasaque gente sua, via quam 
cerva indice didicere, ad Scythiam properant, et quantos- 
cunque prius in ingressu Scytharum habuere, litavere victorise, 
reliquos perdomitos subegere. Nam mox ingentem illam 
paludem transiere, ilico Alipzuros, Alcidzuros, Itamaros, Tini- 
cassos, et Boiscos, qui ripa; istius Scythiee insidebant, quasi 
quidam turbo gentium rapuere. Alanos quoque pugna sibi 
pares, sed immanitate victus, , formaque dissimiles, frequenti 
eertamine fatigantes subjugavere. Nam et quos bello forsitan 
minime superabant, vultus sui terrore nimium pavorem inge- 
rentes fugabant : eo quod erat eis species pavendse nigredinis, 
et velut qusedam (si dici fas est) deformis offa, non facies, 
habensque magis puncta, quam lumina. Quorum animi fidu- 
ciam torvus prodit aspectus : qui etiam in pignora sua primo 
die nata desseviunt. Nam maribus ferro genas secant, ut 
antequam lactis nutrimenta percipiant, vulneris cogantur subire 
tolerantiam. „ Hinc imberbes senescunt, et sine venustate 
ephebi sunt ; quia facies ferro sulcata^ tempestivam pilorum 
gratiam per cicatrices absumit. Exigui quidem forma, sed 



EPILEGOMENA. XXlll 

argiiti, mojibus expediti, et ad equitandnm promptissimi : 
scapulis latis, et ad arcus sagittasque parati : firmis crevicibus, 
et superbia semper erecti. Hi vero sub hominum figura 
vivunt beluina saevitia. Quod genus expeditissimum, multa- 
rumque nationum grassatorium, Getae ut viderunt, expave- 
scunt : suoque cum rege diliberant, qualiter se a tali hoste 
subducant. Nam Hermanricus rex Gotliorum, licet (ut supe- 
rius retulimus) multarum gentium extiterit triumphator, de 
Hunnorum tamen adventu dum cogitat, Roxolanorum gens 
infida, quae tunc inter alias famulatum exhibebat, tali eum 
nanciscitur occasione decipere. Dum enim quandarn mulierem 
Sanielh nomine ex gente memorata, pro mariti fraudulento 
discessu, rex furore commotus, equis ferocibus illigatam, in- 
citatisque cursibus per diversa divelli praacipisset, fratres ejus 
Sarus et Ammius germanae obitum vindicantes, Hermanrici 
latus ferro petierunt : quo vulnere saucius, segram vitam cor- 
poris imbecillitate contraxit. Quam adversam ejus valetu- 
dinem captans Balamir rex Hunnorum, in Ostrogothas movit 
procinctum : a quorum societate jam Wesegothae discessere, 
quam dudum inter se juncti habebant. Inter haec Herman- 
ricus tarn vulneris dolorem, quam etiam incursiones Hunnorum 
non ferens, grandaevus et plenus dierum, centesimodecimo 
anno vitse suae defunctus est. Oujus mortis occasio dedit 
Hunnis praevalere in Gothos illos, quos dixeramus orientali 
plaga sedere, et Ostrogothas nuncupari. 

Wesegothae id est, alii eorum socii, et occidui soli cultores, 
metu parentum exterriti, quidnam de se, propter gentem 
Hunnorum deliberarent, ambigebant : cliuque cogitantes, tan- 
dem communi placito legatos ad Romanian! direxere, ad 
Valentem Imperatorem, fratrem Valentiniani Imperatoris 
senioris, ut partem Thraciae sive Moesiae si illis traderet ad 
colendum, ejus legibus viverent, ejusque imperiis subderentur. 

After this, the narrative becomes properly historical, giving 
the history of the Goths of Mcesia. 



THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 



§ VI. EXTRACT FROM PAULUS DIACONUS DE GEST1S LONGO- 
BARDORUM. 

Paul, the son of Warnefrid {Paulus Warnefridi filius, as 
he is often designated), was deacon of Friuli, and secretary to 
Desiderius, the last king of the Lombards. To the traditions 
and history of those conquerors, his work bears the same rela- 
tion, which that of Jornandes does to those of the Ostro-Goths. 



I. Septentrionalis plaga, quanto magis ab a?stu solis remota 
est, et nivali frigore gelida, tanto salubrior corporibus homi- 
num, et propagandis est gentibus magis coaptata : sicut 
e contra omnis meridiana regio, quo solis est fervori vicinior, eo 
semper morbis abuudat, et educandis minus est apta morta- 
libus. Unde fit ut tanta? populorum multitudines arctoo sub 
axe oriantur : ut non immerito universa ilia regio Tanai 
tenus, usque ad occiduum, licet et propriis loca in ea singula 
nuncupentur nominibus, generali tamen vocabulo Germania 
vocitetur ; quamvis et duas ultra Rhenum provincias Romani, 
cum ea loca occupassent, superiorem inferioremque Germaniam 
dixerint. Ab hac ergo populosa Germania, saspe innumera- 
biles captivorum turmas abducta?, meridianis populis pretio 
distrahuntur. Multa? quoque ex ea, pro eo quod tantos mor- 
talium germinat, quantos alere vix sufBcit, sa?pe gentes egressse 
sunt, qua? nihilominus et partes Asia?, sed maxime sibi conti- 
guam Europam, afflixerunt. Testantur hoc ubique urbes 
eruta?, per totam Illyricum Galliamque : sed maxime misera? 
Italia?, quae pene omnium illarum est gentium experta ssevi- 
tiam. Gothi siquidem, Wandalique, Rugi, Heruli, atque 
Turcilingi, nee non etiam alia? feroces et barbarse nationes, e 
Germania prodierunt. 

II. Pari etiam modo et Winilorum, hoc est, Longobar- 
dorum gens, qua? postea in Italia feliciter regnavit, a Germa- 
norum populis originem ducens, licet et alia? causa? egressionis 
eorum asseverentur, ab insula qua? Scandinavia dicitur adven- 
tavit : cujus etiam insula?, Plinius Secundus in libris, quos De 
Natura Rerum composuit, mentionem facit. Ha?c ergo insula, 



EPILEGOMENA. XXV 

sicut retulerunt nobis, qui earn lustraverunt, non tarn in mari 
est posita, quam marinis fluctibus, propter planitiem mar- 
ginum, terras ambientibus circumfusa. Intra hanc ergo con- 
stituti populi, ctum in tantam niultitudinem pullulassent, ut 
jam simul habitare non valerent, in tres, ut fertur, omnem 
catervam partes dividentes, quse ex illis pars patriam relin- 
quere, novasque deberet sedes exquirere, sorte perquirit. 

III. Igitur ea pars, cui sors dederat genitale solum exce- 
dere, exteraque arva sectari, ordinatis super se duobus ducibus, 
Ibor scilicet et Ayone, qui et germani erant, et juvenili adhuc 
setate floridi, et ceeteris prsestantiores, ad exquirendas quas 
possint incolere terras, sedesque statuere, valedicentes suis 
simul et patriae, iter arripiunt. Horum erat ducum mater 
nomine Gambara, mulier quantum inter suos et ingenio acris, 
et consiliis provida ; de cujus in rebus dubiis prudentia non 
minimum confidebant. 

IV. Haud ab re esse arbitror, paulisper narrandi ordinem 
postponere, et quia adhuc stylus in Germania vertitur, mira- 
culum quod illic apud omnes celebre habetur, sed et qusedam 
alia breviter intimare. In extremis Oircium versus Germanise 
finibus, in ipso Oceani litore, antrum sub eminenti rupe con- 
spicitur, ubi septem viri (incertum ex quo tempore) longo 
sopiti sopore quiescunt, ita inlsesis non solum corporibus, sed 
etiam vestimentis, ut ex hoc ipso, quod sine ulla per tot anno- 
rum curricula corruptione perdurant, apud indociles easdam et 
barbaras nationes, venerationi habeantur. Hi denique quan- 
tum ad habitum spectat, Eomani esse cernuntur. E quibus 
dum unum quidam cupiditate stimulatus vellet exuere, mox 
ejus ut dicitur brachia aruerunt, poenaque sua ceeteros perter- 
ruit, ne quis eos ulterius contingere auderet. Videris ad quem 
eos profectum, per tot tempora providentia divina conservet. 
Fortasse horum quandoque, quia non aliter nisi Christiani 
esse putantur, gentes illse praedicatione sal van dee sunt. 

V. Huic loco Scritobini (sic enim gens ilia nominatur) 
vicini sunt, qui etiam sestatis tempore nivibus non carent, nee 
aliis, utpote feris ipsis ratione non dispares, quam crudis agre- 
stium animantium carnibus vescuntur; de quorum etiam 
hirtis pellibus sibi indumenta coaptant. Hi a saliendo, juxta 
linguam barbaram, etymologiam ducunt. Saltibus enim 



XXVI THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

utentes, arte quadam ligno incurvo, ad amis similitudinem, 
feras assequuntur. Apud hos est animal, non satis absimile 
cervo, de cujus ego corio, ut fuerat pilis hispidum, vestem in 
moduni tunica?, genu tenus aptatam conspexi, sicut jam fati, 
ut relatum est, Scritobini utuntur. Quibus in locis circa 
a?stivale solstitium, per aliquot dies, etiam noctu clarissima 
lux cernitur, diesque ibi multo majores, quam alibi habentur : 
sicut e contrario, circa brumale solstitium, quamvis diei lux 
adsit, sol tamen ibi non videtur, diesque minimi, quam usquam 
alibi, noctes quoque longiores existunt. Quia scilicet quanto 
magis a sole longius disceditur, tanto sol ipse terra? vicinior 
apparet, et umbra? longiores excrescunt. Denique in Italia, 
sicut et antiqui scripserunt, circa diem natalis Domini, novem 
pedes in umbra statura? humana? hora sexta metiuntur. Ego 
autem in Gallia Belgica, in loco qui Totonis villa dicitur, con- 
stitute, status mei umbram metiens, decern et novem et 
semis pedes inveni. Sic quoque contrario modo, quanto pro- 
pinquius meridiem versus ad solem acceditur, tantum semper 
umbra? breviores videntur; in tantum, ut solstitio sestivali 
respicente sole de medio cceli, in ^^Egypto et Hierosolymis, et 
in eorum vicinitate constitutis locis, nulla? videantur umbra?. 
In Arabia vero hoc ipso tempore sol supra medium coeli, ad 
partem aquilonis cernitur, umbra?que versa vice contra meri- 
diem videntur. 

VI. Nee satis procul ab hoc de quo pra?misimus litore, 
contra occidentalem partem, qua sine fine Oceanum pelagus 
patet, profundissima aquarum ilia vorago est, quam usitato 
nomine maris umbilicum vocamus, qua? bis in die fluctus ab- 
sorbere, et rursum evomere dicitur : sicut per universa ilia 
litora, accedentibus et recedentibus fluctibus, celeritate nimia 
fieri comprobatur. Hujusmodi vorago sive vertigo, a poeta 
Virgilio Charybdis appellatur, quam ille in freto Siculo esse 
suo in carmine loquitur, hoc modo dicens : 

" Dextrum Scylla latus, lsevum implacata Charybdis 
Obsidet, atque imo barathri ter gurgite vastos 
Sorbet in abruptum fluctus, rursusque sub auras 
Erigit alternos, et sidera verberat unda." 
Ab hac sane de qua diximus vertigine, sa?pe naves raptim cur- 
simque adtrahi affirmantur, tanta celeritate, ut sagittarum per 



EPILEGOMENA. xxvii 

aera lapsus imitari videantur, et nonnunquam in illo barathro 
horrendo nimis exitu pereunt. Ssepe cum jam jam que mer- 
gendse sint, subitis undarum molibus retroactse tanta rursus 
agilitate exinde elongantur, quanto prius adtractse sunt. 
Affirmant esse et aliam hujusmodi voraginem, inter Britan- 
niam insulam, Galliamque provinciam : cui etiam rei adstipu- 
lantur Sequanicse Aquitanieeque litora, quse bis in die tam 
subitis inundationibus opplentur, ut qui fortasse aliquantulum 
introrsus a litore repertus fuerit, evadere vix possit. Videas 
earum regionum flumina, fontem versus cursu velocissimo 
relabi, ac per multorum millium spatia, dulces fluminum Ijm- 
phas in amaritudinem verti. Triginta ferme a Sequanico 
litore Euodia insula millibus distat, in qua, sicut ab illius 
incolis adseveratur, vergentium in eandem Charybdim aqua- 
rum garrulitas auditur. Audivi quendam nobilissimum Gal- 
lorum referentem, quod aliquantee naves, prius tempestate 
convulsse, postmodum ab hac eadem Charybdi voratse sunt. 
Unus autem ex omnibus viris solummodo, qui in navibus illis 
fuerant, morientibus cseteris, dum adhuc fluctibus spiralis 
supernataret, vi aquarum fluentium abductus, ad oram usque 
immanissimi illius barathri pervenit. Qui cum jam profundis- 
simam, et sine fine patens chaos adspiceret, ipsoque pavore 
prEemortuus, se illuc ruiturum exspectaret, subito quod sperare 
non poterat, saxo quodam superjectus insedit. Decursis siqui- 
dem jam omnibus, quae sorbendse erant, aquis, orse illius 
fuerant margines denudati. Dumque ibi inter tot angustias 
anxius, vix ob metum palpitans resideret, dilatamque ad mo- 
dicum mortem nihilominus opperiret, conspicit ecce subito 
quasi magnos aquarum montes de profundo resilire, navesque 
quse absorptse fuerant, primas emergere. Cumque una ex illis 
ei contigua fieret, ad earn se nisu quo potuit apprehendit : nee 
mora, celeri volatu prope litus advectus, metuendse necis 
casus evasit, proprii postmodum periculi relator existens. 
Nostrum quoque, id est, Adriaticum mare, quod licet minus, 
similiter tamen Venetiarum Histrieeque litora pervadit, credi- 
bile est parvos hujusmodi occultosque habere meatus, quibus 
et recedentes aquse sorbeantur, et rursum invasurse litora 
revomantur. His itaque praelibatis, ad coeptam narrandi 
seriem redeamus. 



XXVlll THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

VII. Igitur egressi de Scandinavia Winili, cum Ibor et 
Ayone ducibus, in regionem qua? appellatur Scoringa veni- 
entes, per annos illic aliquot consederunt. Ulo itaque tem- 
pore Ambri et Assi, Wandalorum duces, vicinas quasque 
provincias bello premebant. Hi jam multis elati victoriis, 
nuncios ad Winilos mittunt, ut aut tributa Wandalis persol- 
verent, aut se ad belli certamina pncpararent. Tunc Ibor et 
Ayo, adnitente matre Gambara, deliberant melius esse armis 
libertatem tueri, quam tributorum eandem solutione foedare, 
mandant per legatos Wandalis, pugnaturos se potius, quam 
servituros. Erant siquidem tunc Winili universi setate juve- 
nili florentes, sed numero exigui ; quippe qui unius non nimise 
amplitudinis insula?, tertia solummodo particula fuerint. 

VIII. Eefert hoc loco antiquitas ridiculam fabulam : quod 
accedentes Wandali ad Wodan, victoriam de Winilis postu- 
laverint, illeque respondent, se illis victoriam daturum, quos 
primum oriente sole conspexisset ; tunc accessisse Gambaram 
ad Fream, uxorem Wodan, et Winilis victoriam postulasse, 
Freamque consilium dedisse, ut Winilorum mulieres. solutos 
crines erga faciem ad barbae similitudinem componerent, ma- 
neque primo cum viris adessent, seseque a Wodan videndas 
pariter e regione, qua ille per fenestram, orientem versus, erat 
solitus adspicere, collocarent : atque ita factum fuisse. Quas 
cum Wodan conspiceret oriente sole, dixisse : Qui sunt isti 
Longobardi ? Tunc Fream subjunxisse, ut quibus nomen 
tribuerat, victoriam condonaret : sicque Winilis Wodan vi- 
ctoriam concessisse. Hsec risu digna sunt, et pro nihilo ha- 
benda. Victoria enim non potestati est adtributa hominum, 
sed e coslo potius ministratur. 

IX. Oertum tamen est Longobardos, ab intactse ferro 
barose longitudine, cum primitus Winili dicti fuerint, ita post- 
modum appellatos. Nam juxta illorum linguam, Lang longani, 
Bart barbam significat. Wodan sane, quern adjecta litera 
Gwodan dixerunt, ipse est, qui apud Romanos Mercurius 
dicitur, et ab universis Germanise gentibus ut deus adoratur ; 
qui non circa hsec tempora, sed longe anterius, nee in Ger- 
mania, sed in Grsecia fuisse perhibetur. 

X. Winili igitur, qui et Longobardi, commisso cum Wan- 
dalis proelio, acriter, utpote pro libertatis gloria decertantes, 



EPILEGOMENA. XXIX 

victoriam capiunt ; qui magnam postmodum famis penuriam in 
eadem Scoringa provincia perpessi, valde animo consternati sunt. 
XL De qua egredientes, dum in Mauringam transire dis- 
ponerent, Assipitti eorum iter impediunt, denegantes eis omni- 
modis per suos terminos transitum. Porro Longobardi, cum 
magnas hostium copias cernerent, neque cum eis, ob pauci- 
tatem exercitus, congredi auderent, dumque quid agere debe- 
rent, decernerent, tandem necessitas consilium reperit. Simu- 
lant se in castris suis habere cynocephalos, id est, canini 
capitis homines : divulgant apud hostes hos pertinaciter bella 
gerere, humanum sanguinem bibere, et si hostem assequi non 
possint, proprium potare cruorem. Utque huic assertioni 
fidem facerent, ampliant tentoria, plurimosque in castris ignes 
accendunt. His hostes auditis, visisque creduli efFecti, bellum 
quod minabantur, jam tentare non audent. 

XII. Habebant tamen apud se virurn fortissimum, de 
cujus fidebant viribus, posse se proculdubio obtinere quod 
vellent, hunc solum pras omnibus pugnaturum objiciunt. 
Mandantque Longobardis, ut unum quern vellent suorum mit- 
terent, qui cum eo ad singulare certamen exiret, ea videlicet 
conditione, ut si suus bellator victoriam caperet, Longobardi 
itinere quo venerant abirent : sin vere superaretur ab altero, 
tunc se Longobardis transitum per fines proprios non veti- 
turos. Oumque Longobardi, quern e suis potius adversus 
virum bellicosissimum mitterent, ambigerent, quidam ex ser- 
vili conditione sponte se obtulit, promittit se provocanti hosti 
congressurum ; ea ratione, ut si de hoste victoriam caperet, a 
se suaque progenie servitutis nsevum auferrent. Quid plura? 
gratanter quse postulaverat esse facturos pollicentur. Aggres- 
sus hostem expugnavit et vicit ; Longobardis transeundi fa- 
cultatem, sibi suisque, ut optaverat, jura libertatis indeptus est. 

XIII. Igitur Longobardi tandem in Mauringam perve- 
nientes, ut bellatorum possint ampliare numerum, plures a 
servili jugo ereptos, ad libertatis statum perducunt ; utque 
rata eorum haberi posset libertas, sanciunt more solito per 
sagittam, immurmurantes nihilominus, ob rei firmitatem, quse- 
dam patria verba. Egressi itaque Longobardi de Mauringa, 
applicuenmt in Golanda, ubi aliquanto tempore commorati 
dicuntur. Post hsec Anthaib et Banthaib, pari modo et 



XXX TT1E GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

Wurgondaib, per annos aliquot possedisse : quae nos arbitrari 
possumus esse vocabula pagorum, seu quorumcunque locorum. 

XIV. Mortuis interea Ibor et Ayone ducibus, qui Lon- 
gobardos a Scandinavia eduxerant, et usque ad hsec tempora 
rexerant, nolentes jam ultra Longobardi esse sub ducibus, 
regera sibi ad cseteraruni instar gentium statuerunt. Regna- 
vit igitur super eos primus Agelmundus, filius Ayonis, ex 
prosapia ducens originem Guningorum, qua? apud eos gene- 
rosior habebatur. Hie, sicut a majoribus traditur, tribus et 
triginta annis Longobardorum tenuit regnum. 

XV. His temporibus queedain meretrix uno partu septem 
puerulos enixa, beluis omnibus mater crudelior, in piscinam 
projecit necandos. Hoc si cui impossibile videtur, relegat 
historias veterum, et inveniet non solum septem infantulos, 
sed etiam novem unam mulierem simul peperisse. Et hoc 
certum est maxime apud iEgyptios fieri. Contigit itaque ut 
rex Agelmundus, dum iter carperet, ad eandem piscinam deve- 
niret. Qui cum equo retento miserandos infantulos miraretur, 
hastaque quam manu gerebat, hue illucque eos inverteret, 
unus ex illis manu injecta hastam regiam comprehendit. Rex 
misericordia motus, factumque altius admiratus, eum magnum 
futurum pronuntiat : moxque eum e piscina levari prsecipit, 
atque nutrici traditum, omni cum studio mandat alendum. 
Et quia eum de piscina, quse eorum lingua Lama dicitur, 
abstulit, Lamissio eidem nomen imposuit. Qui cum adole- 
visset, adeo strenuus juvenis effectus est, ut et bellicossimus 
extiterit, et post Agelmundi funus, regni gubernacula rexerit. 
Ferunt hunc, dum Longobardi cum rege suo iter agentes ad 
quendam fluvium pervenissent, et ab Amazonibus essent pro- 
hibiti ultra permeare, cum earum fortissima in fluvio natatu 
pugnasse, eamque peremisse, sibique laudis gloriam, Longo- 
bardis quoque transitum paravisse : hoc siquidem inter utras- 
que acies prius constitisse, quatenus si Amazona eadem La- 
missionem superaret, Longobardi a flumine recederent ; sin 
vero a Lamissione, ut et factum est, ipsa vinceretur, Longo- 
bardis eadem permeandi fluenta copia preeberetur. Constat 
sane quia hujus assertionis series minus veritati subnixa est. 
Omnibus etenim, quibus veteres historiee notse sunt, patet, 
gentem Amazonum longe antea, quam hsec fieri potuerunt, 



EP1LEG0MENA. XXXI 

esse deletam ; nisi forte quia loca eaclem, ubi hsec gesta 
feruntur, non satis historiograpliis nota fuerunt, et vix ab 
aliquo eorum vulgata sunt, fieri potuerit, ut usque ad id tem- 
pus hujuscemodi inibi mulierum genus haberetur. Nam et 
ego referri a quibusdam audivi, usque hodie in intimis Ger- 
manise finibus gentem harum existere feminarum. 

XVI. Igitur transmeato Longobardi, de quo dixeramus, 
flumine, cum ad ulteriores terras pervenissent, illic per tempus 
aliquod commorabantur. Interea cum nihil adversi suspica- 
rentur, et essent quieti, longa nimis securitas, quse semper 
detrimentorum mater est, eis non modicam perniciem peperit. 
Noctu denique cum negligentia resoluti quiescerent cuncti, 
subito super eos Bulgares irruentes, plures ex iis sauciant, 
multos prosternunt, et in tantum per eorum castra debacchati 
sunt, ut ipsum Agelmundum regem interficerent, ej usque uni- 
cam filiam sorte captivitatis auferrent. 

XVII. Resumptis tamen post hsec incommoda Longo- 
bardi viribus, Lamissionem, de quo superius dixeramus, sibi 
regem constituerunt. Qui ut erat juvenili setate fervidus, et 
ad belli certamina satis promptus, non aliud nisi Agelmundi 
necem ulcisci cupiens, in Bulgares arma convertit. Primoque 
proelio mox commisso, Longobardi hostibus terga dantes ad 
castra refugiunt. Tunc rex Lamissio ista conspiciens, elevata 
altius voce omni exercitui clamare coepit, ut opprobriorum quse 
pertulerant, reminiscerentur, revocarentque ante oculos dede- 
cus, quomodo eorum regem hostes jugulaverint, quam misera- 
biliter ejus natam, quam sibi reginam optaverant, captivam 
abduxerent. Postremo hortatur, ut se suosque armis defen- 
derent, melius esse dicens in bello animam ponere, quam ut 
vilia mancipia hostium ludibriis subjacere. Hsec et hujusce- 
modi vociferans cum diceret, et nunc minis, nunc promissio- 
nibus, ad toleranda eorum amnios belli certamina roboraret : 
si quern etiam servilis conditionis pugnantem vidisset, liber- 
tate eum simul cum prsemiis donaret. Tandem hortatu exem- 
ploque principis, qui primus ad bellum prosilierat, accensi, 
super hostes irruunt, pugnant atrociter, et magna adversarios 
clade prosternunt, tandemque de victoribus victoriam ca- 
pientes, tam regis funus, quam proprias injurias ulciscun- 
tur. Tunc magna de hostium exuviis prseda potiti, ex illo 



XXX11 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

jam tempore, ad expetendos belli labores, audaces eftecti 
sunt. 

XVIII. Defuncto post hsec Lamissione, qui secimdus re- 
gnaverat, tertius ad regni gubernacula Lethu ascendit. Qui 
cum quadraginta ferme aunos regnasset, Hildehoc filium, qui 
quartus fuit iu numero, regni successorem reliquit. Hoc quo- 
que defuncto quintus Gudehoc reguum suscepit. 

After this, the narrative becomes properly historical, and 
gives us the history of the Lombards from the time of 
Odoacer, to that of Charlemagne. 

§ VII. THE TRAVELLERS SONG. 

In the Anglo-Saxon MS., known as the Codex Exoniensis, 
is the following poem. 

It is known as WidsP6, from the name of the narrator with 
which it begins. 

It is better known as The Traveller's Song. 

A claim to an antiquity, as high as the sixth century, has 
been made out for it. It is doubtful, however, whether this 
antiquity is valid in the eyes of any one but its commentators. 

One undoubted element of value, however, it possesses. 
It gives German names in German forms. 

The text is Mr. Kemble's ; to whose Beowulf it is 
appended. 

It is also to be found in Mr. Thorpe's edition of the Codex 
Exoniensis.* 

Wid-siS maSolade, Fselre freojju-webban, 

Word-hord on-leac, Forman sfj?e, 

Se 3e msest HreS-cyninges 

MferSa ofer eorSan, Ham ge-s6hte, 

Folca geond ferde. Eastan of Ongle; 

Oft he flette ge-J>ah, Eorman-rices 

Myne-licne ma^um. Wrafces war-logan. 

Hine from Myrgingum On-gon J>a worn sprecan. 

M\>e\e on-wocon. " Fela ic monna ge-frsegn, 
10 He mid Ealh-hilde, 20 Meegjjum wealdan. 



For the translation see Appendix. 



EPILEGQMENA. 



Sceal Jjeoda ge-hwylc 
peawum lifgan, 
Eorl sefter dbrum 
ESle raedan, 
Se ]>q his Redden -st61 
Ge-)>edn wile. 
para wees Wala 
Hwile se'last ; 
And Alexandreas 

30 Ealra ricost, 
Monna cynnes ; 
And he rn^st ge-Jsah, 
para J?e ic ofer foldan 
Ge-frsegen hsebbe. 
iEtla wedld Hunum, 
Eorman-ric Gotum, 
Becca Baningum, 
Burgendum Gifica, 
Caesare wedld Creacum, 

40 And Cselic Finnum, 
Hagena Holm-rycum, 
And Henden Glommum, 
Witta wedld Swaefum, 
Wada Hselsingum, 
Meaca Myrgingum, 
Mearc-healf Hundingum, 
peddric wedld Froncum, 
pyle Rondingum, 
Breoca Brondingum, 

50 Billing Wernum, 

Os-wine wedld Eowum, 
And Ytum Gef-wulf ; 
Fin Folc-walding, 
Fresna cynne, 
Sige-here lengest, 
Sae-denum wedld. 
Hnsef Hocingum, 
Helm Wulfingum, 
Wald Woingum, 

60 Wod pyringum, 
Sse-ferS Sycgum, 
Swedm Ongend-bedw, 
Sceaft-here Ymbrum, 
Sceafa Long-beardum, 
Hun-hset Werum, 



And Holen Wrosnum. 

Hring-weald was haten 

Here-farena cyning. 

Offa wedld Ongle, 
70 Alewih Denum ; 

Se wses }?ara manna 

Mod gast ealra. 

No hwsebre he ofer Offan 

Eorl-scype fremede ; 

Ac Offa ge-sl6g, 

iErest monna, 

Cniht-wesende, 

Cyne-rica msest. 

Ninig efen eald him 
80 Eorl-scipe maran, 

On orette, 

A'ne sweorde ; 

Merce ge-maerde, 

WicS Myrgingum, 

Bi Fifel-dore, 

Hedldon for$ sibban 

Engle and Swaefe 

Swa hit Offa ge-slog. 

Hrdb-wulf and Hr6S-gar 
90 Hedldon lengest, 

Sibbe set somne, 

Suhtor-fsedran : 

Sibban rry' for-wreecon 

Wi-eynga cynn, 

And Ingeldes 

Ord for-bigdan, 

For-he6wan set. Heorote, 

HeaiSo-beardna b r y m « 

Swa ic geond ferde fela, 
100 Fremdra londa, 

Geond ginne grund, 

Godes and yfles, 
peer ic cunnade, 

Cnosle bi-daeled, 
Freo-msegum feor 
Folgade wide. 
For ]>on ic mseg singan, 
And secgan spell. 
Maenan fore mengo, 
110 In meodu-healle, 



XXXI V 



THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 



H ii me cyne-gode, 

Cystura ddhten. 150 

Ic woes mid Hunum 

And mid HreS-Gdtum, 

Mid Swedm and mid Gcatum, 

And mid SuJ?-Denum, 

MiJ Wcnlum ic wses, and mid 

Wsernum, 
And mid Wi-cingum, 
Mid Gef-jmm ic wses, and mid 

Winedum, 
I 20 And mid Gef-flegum, 

Mid Englum ic woes, and mid 

Swaefum, 
And mid iEnenum, 160 

Mid Scaxum ic wses, and mid 

Sycgum, 
And mid Sweord-wcrum ; 
Mid Ilronum ic wses, and mid 

Dcanum, 
And mid Heajjo-Reamum, 
Mid pyriDgum ic waes, 
And mid prowcndum, 
And mid Burgendum ; 
130 poer ic bcag ge-jsah. 

Mc Jjier GucS-hcre for-geaf 170 

Gloed-licne majjjnvm, 

Songes to leane : 

Noes ■£ soene cyning. 

Mid Froncum ic waes, and mid 

Frysum, 
And mid Frumtingum, 
Mid Rugum ic waes, and mid 

Glommum, 
And mid Rum-Walum ; 
Swylce ic woes on Eatule, 
140 Mid ^lfwine, 180 

Se liaefde mon-cynnes 
Mine ge-fr&ge, 
Leohteste hond 
Ldfes to wyrcenne. 
Heortan undineaweste, 
Hringa ge-dales, 
Beorhtra beaga, 
Beam Ead-wines ; 



Mid Sercingum ic woes, 

And mid Seringum, 

Mid Creacum ic waes, and mid 

Finnum, 
And mid Caesere, 
Se \>e win-burga 
Ge-weald ahte. 
Wiolane and Wilna, 
And Wala-rices, 
Mid Scottum ic waes, and mid 

Pedhtum, 
And mid Scridc-Finnum, 
Mid Lid-wicingum ic waes, and 

mid Lconum, 
And mid Long-beardum, 
Mid H&fcnum and mid Hoelcjjum, 
And mid Hundingum. 
Mid Israhelum ic waes, 
And mid Exsyringum, 
Mid Ebreum, and mid Indeum, 
And mid JEgyptum, 
Mid Moidum ic wees, and mid 

Persum. 
And mid Myrgingum, 
And Mofdingum 
And ongend Myrgingum, 
And mid Amojdngum, 
Mid East-Jjyringum ic woes, and 

mid Eolum, 
And mid Istum, 
And Idumingum ; 
And ic woes mid Eorman-rice ; 
Ealle yrage 

peer me Gotena cyning, 
Gdde ddhte, 
Se me beag for-geaf ; 
Burg-war en a fruma. 
On J?am si ex hund waes, 
Smaetes goldes, 
Ge-scyred sceatta, 
Scilling rime ; 
pone ic Eadgilse 
On aeht sealde, 
Minum bled-drihtne, 
pa ic to bam bi-cwom, 



EPILEGOMENA. 



XXXV 



Ledfum to leane, 
190 pses ]?e he me lond for-geaf, 

Mines feeder e'jsel, 

Frea Myrginga ; 

And me ]>a Ealh-hild 

O'berne for-geaf. 

Dryht-cwen duguj>e, 

Dohtor Ead-wines. 

Hyre lof lengde, 

Geond londa fela, 

pon ic be songe 
200 Secgan sceolde, 

Hweer ic, under swegl, 

Selast wisse, 

Gold-hrodene cwen, 

Giefe bryttian ; 

Don wit Scilling 

Sciran reorde, 

For uncrum sige-dryhtne, 

Song a-hofan, 

Hlude bi hearpan ; 
210 Hleojjor swinsade. 

pon monige men, 

Mddum wlonce, 

Wordum sprecan, 

pa ]>e wel cujjan 

f he nsefre song 

Sellan ne hyrdon ; 

Bonan ic ealne geond hwearf 

E'j>el Gotena. 

S6hte ic a sif>a 
220 Pa selestan, 

pset wses inn-weorud 

Earman- rices. 

He<5can sdhte ic and Beadecan, 

And Herelingas ; 

Emercan sdhte ic and Fridlan, 

Ond East-Gotam 
Frddne and gddne, 
Feeder Un-wsenes. 
Seccan sohte ic and Beccan, 
230 Seafolan, and pedd-ric, 
Heafjo-riCj and Sifecan, 
Hlij?e, and Incgen-bedw, 
Ead-wine sdhte ic, and Elsan, 



iEgel-mund, and Hungar, 
And ]>& wloncan ge-dryht, 
WiS Myrginga. 
Wulf-here sdhte ic and Wyrm- 

here ; 
Ful oft {?ser wig ne a-lseg 
ponne Hrseda here, 
240 Heardum sweordum, 
Ymb Wistla-wudu, 
Wergan sceoldon. 
Ealdne e|>el-stdl 
JEtlan leddum. 

Rsed-here sdhte ic and Rond-here, 
Rum-stan and Gisl-here, 
Wij^er-gield, and Freo^e-ric, 
Wudgan, and Haman. 
Ne wffiron -p ge-sipa, 
250 pa seemestan, 

peah pe ic hy a-nihst, 
Nemnan sceolde. 
Ful oft of J?am heape 
Hwinende fleag, 
Giellende gar, 
On grome J?edde, 
Wreeccan J?8er weoldan, 
Wundnan golde, 
Werum and wifum ; 
260 Wudga and Ham a. 

Swa ic f symle on-fond 
On Jjaere feringe, 
pset se bij? ledfast, 
Lond-buendum, 
Se f>e him god syle<5, 
Gumena rice 
Td ge-healdenne 
penden he her leofa<5„ 
Swa scrij>ende, 
270 Ge-sceapum hweorfaS 
Gled-men gumena, 
Geond grunda fela, 
pearfe secgaS. 
ponc-word sprecaS. 
Simle su<S ojjj'e norS 
Sumne ge-meta<5, 
Gydda gleawne, 

. Q 2 



XXXVI THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

Gcofmn un-hneawne, Lcoht and lif som6J. 

Se \>e fore dugufie wile, Lof se ge-wyrceiS, 

2S0 Dom a r&ran HafaS under heofonum 

Eorl scipe reman, Heali-ffestne dom. 
OJ3j?a;t eal scacetS, 

The three texts of Jovnandes, Paulus Diaconus, and the 
Traveller's Song, give us the rough materials for the criticism 
of the traditions of the Gothic nation. Their historical and 
ethnological value is another question. 

To begin with Jornandes. He quotes more than one 
earlier than himself, e.g., Dio, Dexippus, and Ablavius. For 
contemporary events, any statement of any such writer is 
valuable. 

But what is the value of such earlier writers, in respect 
to the times anterior to their own ? in respect to the archae- 
ology, ethnology, or origines of the Gothic nations \ 

Many put this high ; since the Germania of Tacitus espe- 
pecially mentions the existence of carmina antiqua, and 
access to the carmina antiqua is what may fairly be allowed 
to Ablavius at least. 

The following facts, however, subtract from their value : — 

a. Adaptations to the traditions of other nations (real or 
supposed), known to Jornandes and Paulus Diaconus through 
their ecclesiastical and classical learning are heterogeneously 
intermixed with the proper Gothic narratives. 

b. In the case of Jornandes, numerous real or supposed 
facts, relating to the Geta, are confused with those relating to 
the Gothi. 

These objections are of special application. To which 
must be added those which apply to tradition in general ; 
even in its most unexceptionable form. Upon these, however, 
the present is no place for enlarging. The only question, at 
present, under notice, is the extent to which the migrations, 
which we find in the two Latin writers (for the Traveller's 
Song has but little in this way), rest upon true and genuine 
tradition — true and genuine tradition being the transmission 
of the account of an actual event from one generation to 
another, by smwritten communication. 

For this, it is absolutely necessary that the event trans- 



EPILEGOMENA. XXX Vll 

mitted be a real one ; otherwise, the tradition is only the 
tradition of an opinion, i.e., no tradition at all. 

A tradition, too, must be different from an inference. 
All traditions that coincide with inferences are suspicious ; or 
(changing the expression), all inferences which give us the 
same results as a tradition weaken its validity (i.e., that of the 
tradition). 

This, perhaps, requires illustration. 

In England there existed, at the time of Beda, three 
populations ; one called Angli, one Saxones, and one some- 
times Juta, but oftener Vita. In Hampshire, the Saxones 
and Vitas, or Jut a, came in contact. 

Similarly, in the parts about the Lower Elbe and 
Eyder, there existed three similarly-named populations ; 
one called Angli, one Saxones, and one sometimes Vita, but 
oftener Juta. In Sleswick the Saxones and Juta, or Vita, 
came in contact. 

Now Beda writes that the Juta of England came from 
the Juta of Jutland ; and his statement generally (perhaps 
universally) is supposed to rest on either history or tradition. 

I believe it to rest on neither the one nor the other. I 
believe it to be an inference — an inference so logically correct, 
that I only wonder at the combination of chances which 
make it actually wrong. 

Nevertheless, the truth was as follows. The people of the Isle 
of Wight were called Vita, even as the people of Jutland were. 
And, the people of the Isle of Wight, thus called, lay in 
geographical contact with certain Saxons; those Saxons being 
in similar contact with certain Angles. All this was also 
the case with the ./^landers. 

Such coincidences wanted accounting for. A migration 
did this ; and a migration was inferred. 

The extent to which the similarity of name between Gothi 
and Geta might engender a similar inference, similarly resem- 
bling a tradition, weakens the historical likelihood of the 
truth of Jornandes'' account. 

Such are some of the reasons for considering his derivation 
of the Germans (or Goths) of the Danube from the shores of 
the Baltic, as highly exceptionable. 



XXXV111 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

The analysis, then, of traditions is one element of the 
criticism necessary for the texts in question. 

Another is a correct appreciation of the extent to which 
political alliance coincides with ethnological affinity. Few 
notions are more common than that of populations engaged 
in the same wars, against the same enemies, and playing 
similar parts in history, being, therefore, members of the 
same stock. 

In defensive wars this is generally the case. 

In offensive wars, the union of different stocks (Gallic and 
German, Germanic and Slavonic, Keltic and Iberian, &c.) is 
so frequent, that the fact of a single alliance, comprising two 
populations, is, in many cases, scarcely so much as prima facie 
evidence of their common origin, descent, blood, or ethnolo- 
gical relationship. 

When the names of the leaders of such confederations are 
known, the evidence improves ; but even then it is not con- 
clusive. 

The practical bearings of this, appear in §§ Vandals, and 
Longobardi, and elsewhere. 

For a further notice see Epilegomena, § Quasi-Germanic 
Gauls. 

§ VIII. THE GOTHS, GOTHINI, GOTHONES, GOTHLANDERS, AND 
JUTES. 

In and of itself, the history of the Goths, properly so-called, 
is comparatively simple. We find them called Ostro-Qxoths 
and Fm-Goths ; each with its peculiar royal line — the Ama- 
lungs for the former, the Baltungs for the latter. Separate, 
too, from the other Germanic populations, the Proper Goths 
have their great national heroes ; some truly historical, as 
Alaric, Ataulfus, Euric, Theodoric, and Totila ; others, but 
half-historical or legendary, as the great Hermanric, whose 
power, undoubtedly, had a real existence to a certain extent, 
but many of whose actions are either fabulous or unsupported 
by evidence. 

Above all, the Goths Proper have their special geographical 
area, the starting-point of their power being the Lower or 
the Middle Danube. No mention of their name can be 



EPILEGOMENA. XXXIX 

traced higher than the reign of Caracalla; and (a fact of 
primary importance) they were then in the country of the 
Getee. So they were when Deems and Claudius fought 
against them ; so they were when, pressed by the Huns, 
they besought Valens to allow them to pass the Danube ; so 
they were when Hermanric's kingdom was consolidated, 
and so they were until they invaded Macedonia, Illyri- 
cum, Greece, Italy, Southern Gaul, France and Spain. Of 
all the Gothic families their migrations were the most consi- 
derable. 

It was a long one that took them from Germany to the 
country of the Getee. It was a longer one which carried 
them from the country of the Getee to Spain. 

Of all the Gothic tribes the Goths Proper have most 
merged their nationality in that of the countries which they 
invaded. In Greece, in Italy, in Southern Gaul, and in 
Spain, no Goths are to be found as a separate substantive 
people ; and no known dialect definitely and unequivocally 
represents the old Mceso- Gothic. On the Lower Danube 
itself, the Goths of the Crimea, now no longer distinguished 
by their German tongue, and, consequently, no longer easily 
distinguishable from their neighbours, are their sole represen- 
tatives — if such they can now be called. In Germany itself, 
the mother-country, from which even at the beginning of their 
history they were already separated, the Thuringian dialect is 
supposed to be the most Gothic ; but this — a statement made 
by Michaelis — has yet to be definitely confirmed. 

But the history of the Ostro-Goths and Visi-Goths, is no 
history of all the populations whose name was G-t, G-th, 
or some similar form. Hence arises the long series of ques- 
tions as to whether each population, thus connected in name, 
were connected in other attributes also ; i.e., whether they 
were really Goths, or only populations with a nominal resem- 
blance. 

I. Is there any connection between the Gothones and Go- 
thini ? Three points connect them. 

1. The similarity of names — Gothini as compared with 
Gothones. 

2. The fact that they each differ from the Slavonians of 



xl THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

their neighbourhood — The Gothones are separated from the 
Lygii, the Gothini from the Sarmatse. 

3. Both were — according to the evidence — neither Ger- 
man nor Sarmatian; since the Sarmata treated the Go- 
thini as alienigenec, and the ^Estii spoke what Tacitus calls 
British. 

Do these three points of connection establish an ethnolo- 
gical affinity ? 

I will lay down what I conceive to be an hypothesis capable 
of solving all, or nearly all, the difficulties arising from what 
may be called the pluri-presence of the root G-t, G-th, in the 
two names under consideration. 

This is as follows : the root, G-th, was, in the case of 
the Slavonic and Lithuanian populations, in the same predi- 
cament with the root Gr-Jc, in the case of the Hellenic and 
Italian. 

With the Hellenes, Vgcuxoi was the name of a single popu- 
lation within what, in the eyes of a Roman, constituted the 
Hellenic area ; and the name was, almost certainly, native. 

With the Italians, it was the name, not only for that par- 
ticular tribe, but for the collective Hellenes also. 

Mutatis mutandis. — With the Lithuanians the G-t (G-d, 
G-th) was the name of a single population within what, in the 
eyes of a Slavonian, constituted the Lithuanic area, and the 
name was, almost certainly, native. 

With the Slavonians it was the name not only of that 
particular tribe, but for the collective Lithuanians also. 

Thus — the ^Estii of Tacitus, the Easte of the Germans, 
were called Guttones (Gothones) by the more northern 
Slavonians of their frontier ; just as the T^cuzoi of Epirus 
were called Graci by the Italians of the opposite coast. 

And, the Gothini of Tacitus were called by a similar name 
by the more southern Slavonians of their frontier, just as the 
Athenian Hellenes and others were called Graci by the 
Roman, Campanian, and other Italians. 

Such is the hypothesis. I prefer this to believing that the 
Gothones and Gothini were so much and so thoroughly one 
and the same section of the same branch as for them to have 
borne the same name from Gallicia to Courland : in other 



EPILEGOMENA. xli 

words, I believe the name to be native in one of the two cases 
only ; so that the Goth-mi were G-t only in the eyes of 
their Slavonic neighbours, just as a Peloponnesian was a Greek 
in the eyes of a Roman only; whereas the Gothones (Guttones, 
&c.) were G-t in the eyes of their Slavonic neighbours and 
themselves as well, even as the Ygouzog of Epirus was doubly 
Greek ; Greek when he spoke of himself, and Greek when 
he was spoken of by a Roman. 

The reason for drawing this distinction is as follows : — 

a. There is no evidence of the numerous Lithuanic popula- 
tions ever having had a collective or general name of their 
own, however much they may have had one given them by their 
Slavonic neighbours ; in both of these respects being exactly 
in the same case as the Germans. 

i. For the specific name of a particular Lithuanian popula- 
tion (i.e., for a name equivalent to Chatti, Cherusci, of similar 
divisions of the Germani), the term Gothones (Gothini, Gut- 
tones, &c), if extended from Gallicia to Courland, is of im- 
probable (I do not say impossible), extent. No single section 
of a population is likely to have had so large an area. 

c. The difference between the name of the people (Gothini), 
and their language (Gallica), suggests the likelihood of the 
native of the Gothini having been some form of Gal 
(Hal, &c). In England, in the sixteenth and seventeenth 
centuries, the generality of writers spoke of the people of 
Germany as Germans ; but of the language, as Butch, High 
Dutch, or Low Dutch, as the case might be. Hence, we heard 
of translations from the High Dutch, even though the people 
who spoke it were called Germans. 

Now I consider that the same Slavonians who spoke of 
the people of Gallicia as Gothini (a presumed Slavonic form), 
were also those who spoke of their language as Gallic (a pre- 
sumed native form) ; even as one and the same population (the 
English) spoke of the Dutch tongue and the German people. 

And I also consider that those same Slavonians called the 
language of the Gothini Gallic, because Gallic was the 
native name of it ; just as the fact of Dutch being the native 
name of the German, accounts for the terms High Dutch and 
Low Dutch. 



Xlii THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

In denying the name G-t to be native to the Goth-ini, 
I assume that there is no special evidence in favour of its 
being so ; and such I believe to be the case. 

In affirming the same name to be native to the Goth-ones, 
I am prepared with evidence. 

Is the name which in Tacitus takes the form Gothones 
native or foreign? known to the tribes to which it applies, or 
as strange to them as the term Welsh is to Cambrian ? This 
is not answered in the reasoning upon the word JEstii ; 
since it by no means follows that because one out of two 
names given to a country is undoubtedly foreign, the other 
is necessarily indigenous. The fact of the term Gothones 
being indigenous is not a legitimate inference from the exotic 
character of the name JEslii. Just as the latter designation 
was German, the former may have been Slavonic; and the 
one may have been as unlike the real native name as the 
other. 

Prsetorius, a Pole, writing a.d. 1688, in his Orbis Gothicus, 
devotes two sections to the following questions : — 

" An reliquiae nominis Gothici in terris European Sarmatias 
rcperiantur ? 

" Unde nominis Guddce contemptus hodie in Prussia V 

From these we learn that the Samogitians, Eussians, 
Lithuanians, Prussians, Zalavonians, Nadravians, Natravians, 
Sudovians, Mazovians, and the inhabitants of Ducal Prussia 
were called Guddons by the people about Koningsberg, and 
that this name was a name of contempt, accounted for by the 
extent to which the populations to which it applied, had 
retained their paganism against the efforts of the propagators 
of the Prussian Christianity. " Guddarum infidelium nomen 
existit, adeo ut Gothus sive Guddus idem iis qui paganus et 
ethnicus, hostisque Christianitatis audierit."* 

That it was also Slavonic is shown by a line from an old 
Tshekh (Bohemian) poem. 

Gotskyja krasnyja diewy na brezje sinemu morju. 
Gott-ish fair maidens on bank of (the) blue sea. 

In order to appreciate the full import of the previous state- 

* Lib. i. cap. i. 



EPILEGOMENA. xliii 

ment, I must anticipate a part of my inquiry. Good writers 
have identified those Guddons with the German Goths. As, 
however, they by no means overlook the fact of the Guddons 
being Lithuania, they must suppose that the name was 
retained from that of the earlier Goths subsequently replaced 
by Lithuanians. In which case, the newer inhabitants, 
instead of retaining the name which they brought with them 
from their own country, took that of the older population. 

Now even in its most moderate form, this assumption is 
considerably opposed to the usual course of ethnological 
changes, or rather the usual course of ethnological changes is 
opposed to it. In the first place, there are two cases of the 
incorporated and amalgamated aborigines of a country taking 
the name of their conquerors to one of the converse process. 
Thus France takes its name from the German Franks, and 
England from the German English, instead of the Franks 
taking their name from the Gauls, or the Angles from the 
Britons. Still the converse takes place sometimes ; and, as if 
for the sake of invalidating the very connexion in question, 
one of the best instances of it is supplied by the very district 
under consideration. As far as any change took place at all 
in respect to the conquerors of the parts about the Lower 
Vistula it was just the contrary to the particular instance 
assumed to be the general rule. The German Prussians of 
Prussia did take the name of the aboriginal Prus. 

Now if the name Prussian were adopted by the conquerors, 
who were really Germans, from the conquered, how unlikely 
is it that the lower orders, — the rural population of the agri- 
cultural districts, pre-eminently tenacious of nationality, who 
were really Lithuanians, should adopt the name of any 
previous Germans. In this respect, then, the assumption 
that the term Guddon is proof of the Guthones being German 
Goths is faulty. 

Again — that the term Guddon comes from Gothon — is 
generally admitted. Even, as it is, the preservation of it 
is remarkable. But it becomes doubly remarkable if we 
assume a total change of population to have taken place 
between the time of its first application and the present. 
As it is — the population being supposed to have remained 



xliv THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

unaltered — we have only to account for its permanence. 
Assume, however, a change, and you have an additional 
complication ; since you have to account for its transfer as 
well. 

The present existence, then, of the term Guddon = Go- 
thon — is an argument, as far as it goes, against any change 
of the original population ; or, changing the expression, the 
supposed immigration of Lithuanians, and displacement of 
Germans, which has been shown to be improbable in itself, 
is rendered more so by the details that must be assumed if 
we suppose that the Guddon took their name from any Gut- 
tones who were German. 

In order to make the Gothini as Lithuanic as the Gothones, 
we must suppose one of two things, either that the former 
were an outlying isolated section of the Lithuanic stock, or 
that the intervening areas between the Gothini and Go- 
thones were Lithuanic. Are there any reasons against the 
latter view — reasons against assuming the continuity of a 
Lithuanic population from the Carpathians to the Baltic 
(and vice versa), from the mere magnitude of the area ? None. 
The Lygian, which was parallel with it, is, in the same 
direction (from south to north), fully or nearly as large. 

From the present distribution of the Lithuanian dialects, 
there are several ; but that these are not insuperable, is shown 
in the Prolegomena. 

I do not, however, press the point, since the approach of 
the Gothini to the servile condition indicates the possibility 
of their having been an outlying colony of captives. 

All that I urge is the reference of the two (Gothini and 
Gothones) to a common ethnological division (that division 
being the Lithuanic), and the hypothesis which accounts for 
the similarity of names. 

I also urge the necessity of bringing the older Lithuanians 
as far south as the parts just north of Gallicia, even if we 
hesitate to continue them up to the very country of the 
G-othones. 

For clear and definite history, — and we must remember 
that history for these parts begins but little before the twelfth 
century — brings a Lithuanian population as far in the direc- 



EPILEGOMENA. xlv 

tion of the Gothini as the head-waters and marshes of the 
Pripecz. 

The south-western branch of the Lithuania family was 
well-nigh destroyed in the latter half of the thirteenth cen- 
tury (a.d. 1264 to a.d. 1282); a branch containing the 
important nations of the Pollexiani and Jaztvingi. 

1. The first, — " Sunt autem Pollexiani Getharum seu Prus- 
sorum genus, gens atrocissima, omnium ferarum immanitate 
truculentior, propter vastissimas intercapedines, propter con- 
cretissimas nemorum densitates, propter bituminata inacces- 
sibilia palustria." 

2. The second, — " Est autem Jaczwingorum natio versus 
aquilonarem plagam, Masovite, Bussia et Lithuania? terris 
contermina, sita, cum Pruthenica et Lithuanica lingua habens 
magna ex parte similitudinem et intelligentiam, populos habens 
immanes et bellicosos, et tarn laudis quam memoriae avidos." 
— Dlugoss. i. p. 770. "(Maslaus Mazovitarum princeps) Pru~ 
thenicis auxiliis subnixus — Pruthenos, ad quos confugerat, 
Jacuingos, Slonenses, ceterique Pruthenici tractus barbaros, 
resarciendum casum acceptum pluribus blandimentis et per- 
suasionibus in bellum sollicitat. ,, — Id. i. 223. 

Such the evidence of their existence. 

Of their extinction, — a.d. 1264: — Boleslaus, the Grand 
Duke of Lithuania, so reduced them that — ' ; eo uno prcelio 
omnis fere gens omnisque natio Jaczwingorum adeo deleta 
et extincta est, ut ceteris et his quidem paucis et agrestibus 
aut valetudinariis in ditionem Boleslai concedentibus, aut 
Lithuanis se conjungentibus, hactenus ne nomen quidem Ja- 
czwingorum extetT — Ding. i. p. 771. 

Again — " Omnisque natio Jaczwingorum eo bello (quo- 
niam pedem referre nee unquam pugnam etiam iniquam 
detrectare voluit) deleta est, ut pauci agrestes superstites 
essent, extunc et in temporibus nostris Lithuanis con- 
juncti, sicque nomen Jaczwingorum perrarum et paucis notum 
extety 

In the following list of varieties, to which a name so emi- 
nently Sarmatian in sound as Jaczwing undergoes in different 
MSS. and authors, the last is remarkably like the form 
Gothin-i, since we must remember that the termination -zita is 



Xlvi THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

an affix — Jazwingi, Jatwjezi, Jatwejczi, Jentuisiones, Jen- 
tuosi, Jacintiones, Getwe-zit<z (the country being called Getuesca 
and Gotioezia) Getum-zita. 

II. If the common Lithuanic character of the Gothini and 
Gothones be admitted, the Goths of the Swedish district of 
Gothland may be considered. 

- When two populations of the same name occupy the op- 
posite sides of a sea of moderate breadth, it is reasonable to 
suppose they are branches of the same stock. 

Such is the case with the Goths of Gothland and the Go- 
thones of Courland. 

This prima facie view may, of course, be set aside by 
certain facts. 

Certain facts are against it here. These are — 

a. The present Norse character of the Swedes of Gothland. 

b. The account of Jornandes. 

But (to set against this) the antiquity of the Swedes of 
Gothland is doubtful, and — 

The account of Jornandes is improbable. 

My own belief is that the population from whom the 
Swedish province of Goth-land took the element Goth-, were 
no more the Norse ancestors of its present occupants, than the 
people from whom the county of Dor-set took the element 
Dor-, were Anglo-Saxon ; so that, just as the Dor- in Dor-set 
was a Celtic root (Dur-otriges) though -set was Saxon, so was 
the Goth- in Goth-land other than Norse though -land was 
Norse. 

a. No Scandinavian name in any of the early writers — the 
chief of these being Jornandes — is more German than such 
Anglo-Saxon words as Kent-mo/, or Dor-sat-an ; names of 
which the second parts (-ing, and -safari) are Anglo-Saxon, 
but the first part (Kent-, Dor-) Keltic, Cant-ii, Dur-otriges. 

b. No tradition proves more than the derivation of the Brit- 
ons from Brut-, the grandson of Anchises ; in other words, 
mutatis mutandis, Jornandes takes the place of Geoffrey of 
Monmouth. 

c. No Germanic population is found with any form of the 
root G-t, as its name, until it become an inhabitant of some 
country so designated. 



EPILEGOMENA,. xlvii 

The reasons for the existence of a Lithuanic population in 
Scandinavia, lie chiefly in the facts which it will account 
for. But this reqiures us to be sure that there is no other 
alternative. 

If the existence of a Germanic population will not account 
for the presence of the form G-t (with its varieties) in Scan- 
dinavia, what population will? 

The only two that present themselves for consideration, 
are the Finn, and the Lithuanic. 

The fact of the root in question being known to be Lithu- 
anic, and not known to be Finnic, is prima facie in favour 
of the former. 

The Lithuanian is the only known family of which it 
can be said that G-t, as the name of one of its members, 
in the mouth of a German would be likeliest of all known 
names. 

The only word that can be set up against it Easte = JEsiii, 
that being the only known German name applied to a 
Lithuanian nation. 

But as Easte = eastern it could apply to eastern localities 
only ; not to any in Scandinavia. 

This leaves G-t as the only known name applicable. 

Reasons for its being the one actually applied, are, — 

a. It was, besides being the native, the Slavonic name as 
well. 

b. It was from the Slavonians that the Scandinavian 
Germans were likely to take the name of a population, between 
whom and themselves the Slavonians lay intermediate. 

c. Lastly, to certain of the Lithuanians on the south of the 
Baltic, a compound of the root in question actually was ap- 
plied — East from Poland is RerS-^ota-land — " En austr fra 
Polena er ReiS-^oto-land.'" — Fragment from the Fornalclar 
Sogur. (Zeuss, p. 500). 

The Lithuanians then, south of the Baltic, are called by 
the ancestors of the present Danes, Swedes, and Norwegians, 
G-t. Surely, the same name, applied by the same people on 
the north of the Baltic, is likely to have been applied to 
Lithuanians also. 

III. What applies to the Goths of Goth-land, applies also 



xlviii THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

to the Jutes of Jut-land, one being a name in one dialect of 
the Old Noise, the other in another ; just as, at present, 
Gothenburg begins with G- in the mouth of a Dane, but with 
Y- in that of a Swede — (rdtenburg, Yotenburg. 

IV. Is there any connection between the Getse of Moesia 
and the Gothini, the Gothones, the Gothlanders, the Jut- 
landers, &c, all or any ? In putting this question, we must 
remember that the country of the Getee is the country of the 
Goths also. 

The difficulty involved herein, has already been indi- 
cated.* 

So has the explanation of the greatest Gothic scholar 
living. 

The present writer, in admitting the difficulty, differs 
from Grimm, by admitting the migration from Germany also. 

But he believes that that migration was not undertaken 
by Germans calling themselves Goths. 

He finds no evidence that they called themselves so before 
they reached the country of the Getce. 

They then took the name, and not before ; just as the 
Kent-ings of Anglo-Saxon England took a name from the 
Keltic county of Kent. 

This, however, is only a preliminary consideration. The 
real question is whether, or not, the similarity of name be- 
tween the Get- of the Lower Danube and the G-th of 
Gallicia and Prussia be accidental ? or is it referable to 
ethnological connection ? 

In this case, the distance is sufficient to admit of the 
resemblance to be accidental ; and I do not press the relation- 
ship. Still I believe in it. 

The same Slavonians who, as frontagers, called the one 
Guddon, were the frontagers to the Getce also. 

In this case the connexion is verbal, i.e., it is of the same 
sort which gives the same name to the Welsh of Britain, 
and the Italians, whom the Germans called Welsh also. 
The Germanic populations, which fill up the interval, agree 
in calling their mow- Germanic neighbours by some form of 
the root W-l. 

* Prolegomena, § xiv. 



EPILEGOMENA. xlix 

But, besides this negative character of being wow-Slavonic 
(and therefore called G-t), the two populations in question 
may have been really connected. 

A reason in favour of this (as far as it goes) is found 
in the fact of the Slavonians differing from the Germans 
in the following particulars : — 

The Germans called all wow-Germans by one name — 
Wealh. 

The Slavonians varied the name with the different wow- 
Slavonic populations with which they came in contact. 

Thus — they call the Finns Tshud, and the Germans 
Niemcy ; and this is a reason for thinking that they called 
none G-i, but the Lithuanians. 

Further reasoning on the subject occurs in Epilegomena, 
§ The relations of the Getw to India. 

No objections lie against the Gette and Gothones being 
equally Lithuanic, from the mere magnitude of the area. 
If Slavonians could extend from Servia to Poland, Lithu- 
anians might from Bulgaria to Prussia. 

The objections that arise from the present limited area 
of the Lithuanian tongue are but slight. The limits of that 
tongue have ever receded. 

Lastly, it should be remembered, that whatever facts 
brought the Gothones nearer to the Gothini, brought them 
nearer to the Get a. also. 

Such is the hypothesis ; which, whether convincing or the 
contrary, is submitted to scholars with a claim to their 
careful consideration. It explains the forms Goth, Geta, 
Goth-land, JW-land, Goth-'mus, and Gotho, without assuming 
any migration by land at all ; only two by water (one of 
which is down a navigable river, and the other across a sea 
of moderate breadth) ; any displacement so great as that 
which is known to have occurred over part of the same 
area within the historical period, and any power given to 
any term more general than that which connects the names 
Welsh as applied to a Cambro-Briton, and Welsh as applied 
to an Italian. 



THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 



8 



The royal family of the T7s«goths was that of the Balt- 
ungs ; their chief kings, Fridigera, Athanaric, Alaric, Ataul- 
fus, Wallia, and Euric. 

Their fields of action were the Lower Danube, Macedonia, 
Greece, Italy, Gaul, Spain ; their chief confederations with — 

a. The subjects of Radagaisus, sometimes called, like the 
Visigoths, TorOoi ; but not beyond the suspicion of being Sla- 
vonians, since Radagaisus is a Slavonic rather than a Gothic 
form. 

b. Silingian Vandals (from whom the province of Anda- 
lusia takes its name) in the invasion of Spain. 

c. Alans. — Ibid. 

The evidence in favour of the current opinion, that the 
element Vis- means west, and that Visi-Goth — Western Goth, 
is not conclusive. 

The chief fact in its favour, is the name Ostro-Goih, to 
which Western Goth seems a sort of correlative. Yet such 
correlation is by no means necessary. 

a. In no manuscript of any author, has the name been found 
with a -t, i.e., Westro-Groth. Yet the t- in wes-t is as essential 
as the -t in eas-t. 

b. Vesus, as a simple name, occurs in Sidonius Apollinaris. 

" Burgundio, Vesus, Alites, 
Bisalta, Ostrogothus." 

At the same time, it must be remembered that Jornan- 
des translates the word as Occidentales Gothi. 



§ X. THE OSTEO-GOTHS. 

The royal family of the Ostro-Goths was that of the 
Amal-ungs ; their chief heroes, or kings, Ermanric, Wala- 
mir, Widemir, Theodemir, Theodoric, Totila. 

The empire of Hermanric seems to have been in north- 
eastern Hungary. 

Theodoric was born in the neighbourhood of Vienna. 



EPILEGOMENA. • li 

The chief seat of the Ostro-Goth conquests was Italy. 
Some of them settled in portions of Asia Minor. 

a. Jornandes names a king Ostro-Gotha. 

b. With the exceptions of the Visigoth conquests in Gaul 
and Spain, the localities of the Os^ro-Goths are fully as west- 
ward as those of the so-called Western Goths. 

c. The combination -sir in the river Ister, is identical with 
the combination -sir in Ostr = east. 

All this throws a shade over the usual interpretation of 
the prefix Ostro-. At the same time, nothing very serious 
depends on the etymology. 

The most important question connected with the Ostro- 
Goths and Fm- Goths, is that of their original name. 

If they were not called Goth till they reached the land of 
the Get a, under what name did they leave Germany ? 

Under that of Grut-ungs and Therv-ings : these two desig- 
nations being those which, to say the least, have the best 
claim to be considered the native names of the great Gothic 
conquerors of the fourth, fifth, and sixth centuries. 

In Mamertinus and Eutropius, we find the forms Tervingi ; 
Ammianus , s form is Thervingi. Trebellius Pollio (in Clau- 
dio) has the name Virtingia ; which has, reasonably, been 
considered to be a transposition of Trevingi, or Tervingi. 
The similarity of the name Thuring- leaves as little doubt in 
the mind of the present writer, as to the Thervings of Dacia 
having been originally the Thuringians of Thuringia, as there 
is about the Angles of England having once been the Angles 
of northern Germany. 

The evidence in favour of the Grutungs is less satisfactory. 

a. The termination only is known to be German ; the 
root is only supposed to be so. 

h. More than one writer calls them 'S/cvdai. 

c. The following passage distinguishes them from the 
Ostro- Goths — 

Ostrogothis colitur mixtisque Grutuvgis 
Phryx ager. — Claudian. 
But as even the undoubted Goths are called Scythians by 
Zozimus, the second objection, the strongest of the three, is 
but slight. 

it 2 



Hi THE GERMANY OE TACITUS. 

In favour of them, is — 

a. The fact of the termination -ung being German. 

b. Their proximity to the Thervings. 

c. The few facts known of their history. — Olaudian de 
Quart. Oonsulat. Honorii, x. 623 — 637, writes, — 

"Ausi Danubium quondam tranare Grutungi 
In ]intivs fregere nonius, ter mille ruebant 
Per fiuviura plense cuneis immanibus alni. 
Dux Edotheus erat. Tantre conamina classis 
Incipiens retas ct primus eonfudit annus. 
Submcrsa? sedcre rates, lluitantia nunquam 
Largius Arctoos paverc cadayera pisces. 
Corporibus premitur Pcucc, per quinquc recurrens 
Ostia barbaricos vix egerit unda cruores. 
Confessusque parens Edutlici regis opima 
llcttulit, cxuviasqnc tibi : civile secundis 
Confieis auspiciis bellum ; tibi debeat orbis 
Fata (Jrutungorum, debellatumque tyrannum. 
Ister sanguineos egit te consule montes." 

This crossing of the Danube, coincides in time with that 
of the Goths ; as do the quarrels which rose out of it. 

If the doctrine, that the Grutungs were Goths, though 
highly probable, be not wholly unexceptionable, the special 
identification of the Os^ro-Goths with them, is still less so. 

That the Thervings, however, were the Visigoths, is shown 
by so good an authority, as Ammianus calling Athanaric, 
Thervingorum judex (xxxi. 3) ; this Athanaric being the 
famous Visi-goth. 

§ XI. THE ALBMANNI. 

The first mention of the name, Alemanni, occurs in the same 
reign with that of the Goths, i.e., the reign of Caracalla. 

The standard quotation respecting the derivation of the 
name from al—all, and m-n=man, so that the word (some- 
what exceptionably) denotes men of all sorts, is from Agathias, 
who quotes Asinius Quadratus : — Oi he AXajjuavol, eiye 
%pr) Acnvvlw Kovahpdru) eireadai, avhpl 'iTaXicorr) koX tcl 
Tep/juavifca e? to a/cpL§e<i dvajpa-^rafxevoj, %v<yfc~kvhe<i elcriv 



EPILEGOMENA. liii 

av0p(O7roc Kal fiiydSes, teal tovto Svvarac avrois rj eVeovu- 
fita. — Agath. Hist. i. 6. 

Notwithstanding this, I think it is an open question, 
whether the name may not have been applied by the truer and 
more unequivocal Germans of Suabia and Franconia, to certain 
less definitely Germanic allies from Wurtemburg and Baden, 
— parts of the Decumates agri, — parts which might have 
supplied a Gallic, a Gallo-Roman, or even a Slavonic element 
to the confederacy ; in which case, a name so German as to 
have given the present French and Italian name for Germany, 
may, originally, have applied to a population other than 
Germanic. 

I know the apparently paradoxical elements in this view ; 
but I also know that, in the way of etymology, it is quite 
as safe to translate all by alii, as by omnes : and I cannot 
help thinking that the al- in Ale-manni is the al- in alir-arto 
(a foreigner, or man of another sort), eli-henzo {an alien), and 
ali-]and (captivity in foreign land) — Grimm, ii. 628 — Recht- 
salterth, p. 359. And still more satisfied am I that the Al-, 
in Al-emaimi is the al- in Al-satia=el-8ass=^ali-satz=foreign 
settlement. In other words, the prefix in question is more 
probably the al- in else, than the al- in all. 

Little, however, of importance turns on this. 

The locality of the Alemanni was the parts about the 
Limes llomanus, a boundary which, in the time of Alexander 
Severus, Niebuhr thinks that they first broke through. Hence 
they were the Marchmen of the frontier, whoever those 
March men were. 

Other such Marchmen were the Suevi ; unless, indeed, we 
consider the two names as synonyms. Zeuss admits that, 
between the Suevi of Suabia, and the Alemanni, no tangible 
difference can be' found. 

The area whence we bring these Alemanni, or Suevi of 
Suabia, must fulfil certain conditions. 

It must not be too limited ; since it is the area from which 
not only the agri Decumates were Germanized in the first 
instance, but from which, eventually and indirectly, Switzer- 
land and Austria have been, partially, Bavaria, wholly, Ger- 
manized. 



Hv THE- GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

Neither must it be too large ; inasmuch as room must be 
left for the equally important divisions of the Burgundians, 
during the later, and for the Goths of the Danube, the Thu- 
ringians, and the Chatti, in the earlier, period of their history. 

Modern Suabia comes under this category ; so that modern 
Suabia may be considered as the nucleus of the Alemanno- 
Suevic confederation. 

That active emperor, Probus, coerced the Alemanni ; he 
coerced them and something more. He recovered the whole 
country of Suabia, and is said to have re-established the limes. 

But from the time of Probus downwards, the Alemanno- 
Suevic encroachments steadily progressed. Before a.d. 300, 
they had become the ancestors of the present Germans of 
Switzerland ; and, by a.d. 400, those of the Alsatians and 
Bavarians. 

Such was their time and scene. Strongly contrasted with 
the Goths, they advanced their frontier gradually and con- 
tinuously ; and the effect of this is, that one half of what at 
present constitutes the High-German division, is of Alemanno- 
Suevic origin. 

In individual heroes this division is poor ; none of its 
kings or generals having the prominence of an Alaric, a 
Theodoric, a Gundobald, or a Olovis. 

Putting together what has been said about the names 
Alemanni and Suevi, it is just possible that, of the two chief 
members of this alliance, those whose name was German 
were Gauls (the Alemanni) , and those whose name was Gallic 
(Suevi) were Germans. This, however, is a forcible way of 
putting an apparent objection, rather than an objection itself. 

If the Alemanni, originally, were not German, their 
nationality and characteristics must have merged into that 
of the Suevi early. 

Believing the Vandal to have been Slavonic, the Alemanni 
(supposing al- to mean alii) would be in the same relation to 
the Suevi as the former were to the Goths. 

It is not superfluous to remark, that the Alemanni and Alani 
are undoubtedly confused by more than one ancient writer, — 
a pregnant source of difficulty, which it is not necessary at 
present to enlarge on. . 



EPILEGOMENA. lv 



§ XII. THE BURGUNDIANS. 

A document of a.d. 786, in noticing the high tract of lands 
between Ellwangen and Anspach, has the following expres- 
sion, — in Waldo, qui vocatur Virgunnia. 

Grimm looks for the derivation of this word in the Moeso- 
Gothic word fairguni, Old High German fergunnd = woody 
Mil-range. 

He also quotes the variations Vergunt, Virgunda, and 
Virgunndia. 

I have little doubt but that this is the name of the tract 
of land from which the name Burgundi arose; and that it 
is the one which fixes their locality. 

If so, between the Burgundian and Suevic Germans, the 
difference, such as it was, was probably, almost wholly poli- 
tical ; both being High Germans of the water-system of the 
Maine and Neckar. 

Nor is there much difference in the time and scene of the 
histories. Each encroached on the Roman frontier, but the 
Burgundians more exclusively in the direction of Gaul. 

Mutatis mutandis, the latter were in Burgundy, what the 
former were in Alsatia, with this difference, that the Ger- 
mans of the former area have now become Gallicized. 

No section of the Germans exceeds the Burgundians, in 
the extent to which real or accredited acts of their historical 
great men, have developed themselves into legend; Gunther, 
Gundobald, and others, being the great centres of the Bur- 
gundian cycle. 

1. Part of the Burgundian history is probably told under 
that of the name of Franks, since, it is not likely that, 
between the Germans who gave the name to Burgundy, and 
the Germans who gave the name to Franche-Gomte , there was 
much ethnological difference, even if there were political 
ones ; in other words, it is likely that some Burgundians 
were Franks. All were so in one sense. — See § xiv. 

2, Part of the history which passes as Burgundian, can, 
on reasonable grounds, be deemed never to have been 
Burgundian at all ; a fact which complicates the view of 



lvi THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

the true Burgundians, in a manner the very reverse of the 
preceding - remarks. 

The Napoviyyoi of Ptolemy, on the Thuringian frontier, 
were Burgundian. 

But these Mapoviyyoi are Merovingians. 

Hence, the Merovingians of France are Merovingians, 
not because they were the Merovingians of the conquerors of 
that empire, but because they were the Merovingians of Bur- 
gundy, or (perhaps, more specifically still, of) Franche- 
Comte. 



§ XIII. THE UURGUNDIONES OF PLINY. 

It is stated in the preceding chapter, that part of the 
history of another and different population may have been 
attributed to the Burgundians of Burgundy, 

Pliny (H. N. iv. 14) writes, " Germanorum genera quinque : 
Vindili, quorum pars Burgundiones, Varini, Oarini, Guttones. 
Alterum genus Ingsevones, quorum pars Cimbri, Teutoni ac 
Chaucorum gentes. Proximi autem Rheno Istsevones, quorum 
pars Cimbri mediterranei Hermiones, quorum Suevi, Her- 
munduri, Ohatti, Oherusci. Quinta pars Peucini, Basternse 
. . contermini Dacis." 

This place, with Daci, Vindili, Varini, Carini, and Guttones, 
is somewhat strange for a people of Franconia. Its proper clas- 
sification was, surely, with the Suevi, Hermunduri, Ohatti, &c. 

To this it may be added, that there are several isolated 
actions, such as a contest with the Goths, and another with 
Fastida, king of the Gepidse, which give us Burgundiones too 
far down the Danube, to leave the history of the Burgundians 
of Burgundy so simple, as it was left in the chapter referred to. 
In other words, there must be either migration or another 
population called Burgundian. 

The second alternative seems preferable ; indeed the exist- 
ence of such a second population is so certain, that the question 
is, not whether there were two Burgundies, but which of the 
two it was that Fastida (or the Goths) fought against, and 
which it was that Pliny meant by Burgundi 

a. I think that these two were the same. 



EPILEGOMENA. lvii 

b. Also, that they were the Qpovyovvhitoves of Ptolemy. 

c. Also, the Ovpovyovvhot of Zosimus. 

d. Also, the Bovpovyovvhoi of Agathias. 

e. Possibly the Bulgarians of the later historians. 

They were occupants of the parts east of the Upper Vis- 
tula, or between the Vistula and Bug. They were well- 
known to the Greek writers of the Byzantine empire ; and 
the only question concerning them is, whether they were 
Scythians or Huns. — Ovtol he airavreq Kocvfj p,ev S/eu&u ical 
Qvvvoi eirtoVOfMa^ovTO' ihiq he Kara <yiv7), to puev rt avrcov 
Korplyovpot, to he OvTLjovpoc, aWoi he OvXTL^ovpoo, icah 
oXkoi Bovpovyovvhot. . . avTina yovv Ov\Ti^ovpot T6 koX 
Bovpovyovvhot peXP L ^ v AeovT09 tov avTOKpaTopos ical twv 
ev tu> tot6 'Pco/xalcov yvcopi/JLol T6 virripyov ical aXicifioi 
elvcti ehoKovv ' 3]/x6t9 he ol vvv ovt6 tafiev avTOV^, ovTe, oljiai, 
elo-ofjueOa, Tvypv fiev hiafydapevTas, Tvyov he a)? it opp cot cut co 
tieTavao-TavTas. — Agathias, v. 11. 

Still the similarity of the name is remarkable. 

Considering, however, that their neighbours on the south 
were the Goths of the Danube, that the name is by no means 
necessarily native, that their country was the water-shed of 
the Vistula and Bug, and that fairguni= hill* in Gothic, it is 
by no means unlikely that, different as were the nations, these 
names may have been the same, i.e., the German form for 
Highlander. Still it is quite as likely to be accidental ; and, 
if the Burugundi of the Bug were Bulgarians, is so. 

But the difficulty does not end here. Ptolemy has, besides 
his <t>povyovvhla)ve<i, a population called BovyovvTai. 

a. The AlXovaicoves (Helveconse, see note in voc.) lay 
between the 'PovTiickeioi and the BovyovvTai. 

b. The Lygii Omani came iiirb tovs BovyovvTa?. 

c. The BovyovvTai came east of the Semnones, from the 
river Suebus (Sou^^o?) to the Vistula. 

These are very difficult conditions. At first it appears that 
we must separate the BovyovvTai from the <l>povyovvhia)ve<;, 
because Ptolemy mentions both ; and that we must consider 
the former to be the Burgundians of Franconia, because 
Ptolemy does not mention these latter. 
* See page lv. 



lviii THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

We must do this, in order to avoid accusing a good writer 
of an omission on one side, and a repetition on the other. 
Then, as to the locality, 

a. The 'VovTLKKetoL are on the Lower Vistula. 

b. The Lygll- Omani, in the western part of Poland. 

c. The Semitones, in Saxony. This leaves those parts of 
Lusatia and Silesia, which were not occupied hy the StXlyyoi 
as the country of the Bovyouvrac, too far to the north west for 
the <$>povyovv8i(ove<;, and too far to the east for the Bur- 
gundians. 

It is nearest, however, to the former ; and hence it is the 
word <$>povyovv8iC0ve<;, a term in Slavonic rather than German 
ethnology, of which the name Bovyovvrcu obscures the im- 
port. 

At the same time, the complication which the two terms 
introduce in the otherwise clear and simple history of the 
true and undoubted Germanic Burgundians of Franconia and 
Burgundy, is by no means inconsiderable, neither does the 
present writer pretend to explain it. 

All that he is inclined to do, is in the way of a negation. 
He is not prepared to connect the three by migrations and 
counter-migrations, simply and solely on the strength of the 
similarity of name. 



$ XIV. THE FRANKS. 

If Frank, =free, express an attribute, the name may appear 
as often as the attribute occurs. 

That Frank was the name of a confederation rather than 
of a particular nation, is generally believed ; all the members 
of it agreeing in calling themselves free. 

Believing this, I believe that the view it involves may be 
extended ; and that just as more nations than one formed a 
Frank confederacy, more confederacies than one may be 
included in the Frank name ; and, if more confederacies, 
more sections and sub-sections of the Germanic stock. 

Hence, instead of assuming migrations (many of them in 
the face of historical probabilities), to account for the Franks 
of France, the Franks of Franche- Comte, and the Franks of 



EPILEGOMENA. lix 

Franconia, we may simply suppose them to be Franks of 
a different division of the Frank name. 

All that follows from the proposed latitude given to the 
name Marcomanni, follows from the proposed latitude given 
to the name Frank. 

Indeed, if we look at their geographical distribution, we 
shall find that the Franks were the Marchmen of the Roman 
frontier ; and I submit to the reader the doctrine, that 
they called themselves Franks because they were so, i.e., in 
opposition to their fellow-Germans, who were subject to 
Rome. 

A German of the Decumates agri was not a Frank (though 
he might be an Alemann), because he was not really free. 

The Burgundian of the interior country was not a Frank. 
Really free he was ; but as his freedom was not contrasted 
with the dependence of his neighbours, it was not necessary 
for him to call himself so. 

What is gained by the hypothesis ? To say nothing about 
the minor migrations, it gets over (amongst others) the fol- 
lowing great difficulty. 

The Franks of Franconia are High ; those of the Lower 
Rhine, Low Germans. 

Such the hypothesis. 

I. The Franks of the southern frontier. — Probus had to deal 
with both Alemanni and Franks. It is probable that these 
were the Franks of Franconia. 

The Franks whom Aurelian chastised, were certainly so ; 
and, upon the whole, I think it is these Franconian Franks 
(the Franks of the Upper Rhine) who appear earliest 
in history. Even if they do not, they appear far too soon 
to have the name accounted for by any conquests or migra- 
tions ; movements either way, from the Upper to the Lower, 
or from the Lower to the Upper Rhine, involving equally 
great, though different difficulties. 

The measure of the southern, or Franconian Frank con- 
quest, is to be found in the name Franche-QomtQ ; this being 
to them as Alsatia is to the Alemanno-Suevians, and Bur- 
gundy to the Burgundians. 

The geographical relations of Franche-Comte and Bur- 



IX THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

gundy, along with the Frank character of the (geogra- 
phically) Burgundian Merovingians, give the chief reason 
for believing that those tribes who were politically Franks 
of the Upper Rhine, were geographically and ethnologically 
Burgundians, at least for the middle portion of them. The 
southern members of this group were probably Suevian, the 
northern Hessian. 

Again — the relations of the Burgundian Gunther to the 
Frank Sigfrid, in the traditions embodied in the Nibelungen 
Lied connect the two. 

II. The Franks of the northern frontier.-^-The chief tribes 
who, ethnologically, formed this district were, as long as 
the early name (the name by which they were known to the 
Gauls) preponderated, Sicambri. In detail, they were Gam- 
brimi, Marsi, Gugemi, and, probably, JJbii, Usipii, and 
Tencteri, Bructeri, &c. 

When known as Germans, the collective name was out 
of place ; since Tiberius, Drusus, and the other conquerors of 
the Lower Rhine, had not so much to deal with Germans 
as opposed to Gauls, as with Germans as opposed to each 
other. Hence came the less necessity for a collective name, 
and the greater necessity for a number of specific ones. The 
Sicambri of the Gauls are now the Bructeri, Tubantes, &c, 
of the Germans. 

When the necessity for the distinction between the de- 
pendent Germans of the Roman territory, and the free 
Germans of the frontier (March) became necessary, the 
necessity of a general name came in again. This general 
name was Frank. The Franks of the Lower Rhine seem to 
have heen chiefly Platt-Deutsch, though, partially, Old Saxon 
and Frisian as well. 

The time of the actions of the Franks of the Lower 
Rhine, was a little later than that of those of the Upper ; but 
it lasted longer. Its development consisted in the conquests 
of Olovis and Charlemagne. Its measure is to be found in the 
name France, and in the Saxon and Slavonian conquests. 

In France, the Franks of the Lower Rhine, and the Franks 
of the Upper Rhine, met in the parts about Franche-Comte, 
and combined ; the former swamping the latter, and making 



EPILEGOMENA. Ixi 

it appear as if Franche-Gomte and France took their name 
from the same Franks — such not being the case. 

Again — the Franks of France appropriated the traditions 
of those of Burgundy, and, deducing themselves from Me- 
roveus, became Merovingians ; though that name is Burgun- 
dian. 

The Franks of the Lower Ehine, like the Goths, much as 
they have conquered, have failed in continuing the existence 
of their Frank character. Those of France are French- 
men ; those of Low Germany, read in High German — their 
chief spoken language, the Platt-Deutsch dying out. 

In Holland alone are they a separate substantive people — 
in Holland, minus Friesland. 

It was the Low-German Franks who swept before them, 
and extinguished the Saxons — the continental ancestors of 
the English. 

III. The Franks of the middle frontier. — These, as being 
difficult to separate on their southern and northern frontiers 
from those of Burgundy and Lower Rhine, have heen taken 
last in order. They are the Hessian Franks (Chattische 
Franken) of Zeuss. Their history is less obscure than un- 
distributed, i.e., distinguished from that of the Franks above 
and below them. 

Still there are the Franks, whose legends Sigfrid and the 
Nibelungen Lied represent, Franks more High than Low 
Germanic, as shown by the great extent to which Burgun- 
dians come in contact with the hero of that poem ; which 
the Salian or Ripuarian Franks do not. 



5 xv. THE SALII. 

Franks, in respect to their independence, the Salii were, 
probably, intrusive Low Germans ; their locality being the 
present /SW-land, near Deventer, and the banks of the Y-sel. 



§ XVI. THE RIPUAEII. 

Ethnologically, the Bip-uavii were Franks of the Bipee 
(the hanks of the Rhine), &c. 



lxii THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

Their name shows the possibility of a hybrid word ; since 
-uarii=the -iceere in Cant-to<ere, &c. ; so that the Rip-uarii 
were really the Rip-i-cola. 

§ XVII. THE VARANGIANS. 

This was the name of the Byzantian equivalent to the 
soldiers of a free-company in the eleventh and twelfth 
centuries. 

These soldiers were almost wholly Scandinavians — to a 
great extent the Swedes of Russia. 

The reasons against believing Varangian to be the same 
word as Frank, are — 

1. The mention of Franci along with them, as a separate 
people. 

2. The extent to which the Varangians were Scandina- 
vians, rather than Germans of the Rhine. 

In favour of it is — 

The form of the present Oriental name for Europeans — 
Feringi. 

This, in my mind, preponderates. 

Connected by name only with the Franks, the truer ethno- 
logical affinities of the Varangians were with the Scan- 
dinavians of Russia. 



§ XVIII. THE RUSSI, OR 'Pfo>9. 

I follow Zeuss in giving the Greek name (Tw?) of this 
people ; since the form Russian would convey a wrong idea. 

No name is involved in more difficulties. 

No history is more interesting. 

The result of an attempt to construct a probable hypo- 
thesis out of the valuable facts given by Zeuss (ad v.), is 
as follows : — 

In the eighth, ninth, and tenth centuries, the Dnieper, 
Volga, and Don, played the same part in determining a 
distant fluviatile migration with the Scandinavians, that the 
Danube is supposed to have done with the Thuringian and 
Bavarian Germans ; or (mutatis mutandis) a series of migra- 



EPILEGOMENA. lxiii 

tions in boats similar to that which took the Germans to 
Moesia, took the Norsemen to the Black and Caspian Seas. 
Just, too, as the navigation of the Upper Danube implies 
the occupancy of some part of its banks, I imagine that those 
parts of Russia, where the systems of the Dnieper and Volga 
come in closest contact, were the seats of certain Norsemen ; 
intrusive members of the Scandinavian division, who had 
penetrated from the Baltic to the head- waters of the rivers 
in question, at the expense of the original Lithuanians and 
Ugrians. The undoubted fluviatile character of this migra- 
tion is an argument in favour of that of the Goths of Moesia 
having been fluviatile also. 

The evidence in support of this doctrine is as follows : — 

1. The expedition which brought the Norsemen to Con- 
stantinople was by water : — Kar etcelvov jap rbv /ccupbv to 
puaupovoorarov rwv 1,KV0cbv eOvos, ol \e<yop,evot r P<w?, 8ia rod 
JLv^ecvov 7T0VT0V irpoGKe'xaypriKOTes rqj ErevS, teal rrdvra fiev 
%copla, rrdvra he p,ova(rrt]pia Snip'Tra/cores, en Srj teal roiv 
rod Bv^avriov rrepioucihcov Karehpapuov vrjaimv, crKevij puev 
iravra Xrj'i^opbevoc teal ^prjpuara, avdpcoirovs he rovs dXovraq 
rrdvra^ arroKreivovre^. Fboo? of? teal rwv rov Tlarptdp^ov 
Clyvarlov) pbovao-rrjpcctiv /3ap§apitc<p tcarahpapbovres oppbripban 
teal &vp,(p, rrdaav fiev rrjv evpedelcrav tcrrjcri,v a<peikovro, 
eLKoert he ical hvo roiv yvrjcrccorepcov avrov zee /cparr) /core? 
oltceroiv, i(f> evl rpoyavrr)pi rfkoiov roiiq iravras a^ivac? 
KarepuekLo-av. — Vita S. Ignatii. 

2. It was fluviatile, i.e., via a river rather than the ocean. 
The proof of this lies in a long quotation from the Arabian 
writer Ibn Fozlan, to be found in Zeuss (p. 550), describing 
their descent upon Georgia and Ajerbijan, by means of a fleet 
on the Caspian. 

3. It was Norse : — " Misit etiam (Theophilus) cum eis 
quosdam, qui se, id est gentem suam B/ws vocari dicebant, 
quos rex illorum, Chacanus vocabulo, ad se amicitise, sicut 
asserebant, causa direxerat, petens per memoratam epistolam, 
quatenus benignitate imperatoris redeundi facultatem atque 
auxilium per imperium suum totum habere possent, quoniam 
itinera, per quse ad ilium Constantinopolim venerant, inter 
barbaras et nimiae feritatis gentes immanissimas habuerant, 



lxiv THE GERMANY OF TACITUS- 

quibus eos, ne forte periculum inciderent, redire noluit. 
Quorum adveiitus causam iiuperator diligentius investigans, 
comperit eos gentis esse Sueonum, explovatores potius regni 
illius nostrique quam amicitise petitores ratus, penes se eousque 
retinendos judicavit, quod veraciter invenire posset, utrum 
fideliter eo necne pervenerint ; idque Theophilo per memoratos 
legatos suos atque epistolam intimare non distulit, et quod 
eos illius auiore libenter susceperit, ac si fideles invenirentur, 
et facultas absque illorum periculo in patriam remeandi 
daretur, cum auxilio remittendos ; sin alias, una cum missis 
nostris ad ejus prsesentiam dirigendos, ut quid de talibus fieri 
deberet, ipse decernendo efficeret. 1 '' — Annal. Bertin. Pertz i. 434. 

The only shade that has been thrown over this conclusion 
is the apparent use of the Turk word Chacan = Khan ; but 
Zeuss well suggests that this is no Turk title, but the Norse 
proper name Hakon. 

And, to confirm all this, Liutprand writes : — " Gens quae- 
dam est sub aquilonis parte constituta, quam a qualitate 
corporis Grseci vocant Bussos, nos vero a positione loci voca- 
mus Nordmannos. Lingua quippe Teutonum nord aquilo, 
man autem mas seu vir dicitur, unde et Nordmannos aquilo- 
nares homines dicere possumus. Hujus denique gentis rex 
Inger vocabulo erat, qui collectis mille et eo amplius navibus 
Constantinopolim venit. — Compositis itaque secundum jussio- 
nem suam chelandriis, sapientissimos in eis viros collocat 
(Romanus Imperator), atque ut regi Ingero occurrant, denun- 
ciat. Profecti denique, cum in pelago eos impositos rex 
Inger aspicerit, exercitui suo prsecepit, ut viros illos caperet 
et non occideret. Denique miserator et misericors Dominus, 
qui se colentes, se deprecantes, se adorantes non solum prote- 
gere, verum etiam victoria voluit honorare, ventis tunc placi- 
dum reddidit mare. Secus enim ob ignis emissionem Grsecis 
erat incommodum. Igitur in Russorum medio positi ignem 
circumcirca projiciunt. Quod dum Russi conspiciunt, e navi- 
bus confestim sese in mare projiciunt eliguntque potius aquis 
submergi, quam igni cremari. Alii tunc loricis et galeis 
onerati, nunquam visuri ima pelagi petunt, nonnulli vero 
natantes inter ipsos maris fluctus uruntur, nullusque die ilia 
evasit, qui fuga sese ad terram non liberavit. Russorum 



EPILEGOMENA. Ixv 

etenlm naves ob parvitatem sui ubi aquae minimum est 
transeunt, quod Grraecorum clielandria ob profunditatem sui 
facere nequeunt. Ingenti Inger confusione postmodum ad 
propria est reversus. Grraeci vero victoria potiti, vivos secum 
multos ducentes, Constantinopolim regressi sunt leeti. Quos 
omnes Romanus in preesentia Hugonis nuncii, vitrici scilicet 
mei, decollari prtecepit." — Liutprand, Hist. v. 6. 

Lastly (and this also indicates the flnviatile character of 
the invasion as well), a remarkable passage in Constantinus 
Porphyrogenita not only distinguishes the Buss tongue from 
the Slavonic, but gives the names of the different falls of the 
Dnieper in both languages. Zeuss quotes Lehrberg, as having 
shown the Buss forms to be Norse ; and without saying that 
the others are not, I admit that two of them are undoubtedly 
so; being compounds of the Norse word, fors=force, in pro- 
vincial English, = waterfall. — Ets rbv rrk^rrrov ^pa'yfjbbv rbv 
e7rovo/u,a^6fievov 'Vcocnarl fiev BapovcjiSpos, 'SfcKaSivto-rl 8e 
BovXvrjTrpdx' Slotl fie'ydXTjv \[[xvrjv d-TTorekel. — Constant, de 
A dm. Imp. c. 9. 

Again, 

Ei? rbv erepov <ppa<yp,bv rbv e7ri\e<y6fievov 'PgxtmttI /juev 
Ov\§opcrl, ^Kka^tvicrrl Se ''Oarpo&ovviTrpa'X orrep ep/HTjveve- 
rai rb V7]crlov rov (fipayfiov. — Ibid. 

Vorenfors is, at the present moment, the name of the 
highest waterfall in Norway. Holmfors=the water-fall of 
the island, not the island of the waterfall. 

The fact of a Swedish invasion of the Crimea, Thrace, 
Persia, and Georgia, and the inference of a consolidated 
Swedish occupancy of the watershed of the Volga and 
Dnieper, is clearer than the origin of the name. 

In favour of its being Norse, are — 

a. All the previous extracts. 

b. A curious expression in Symeon Magister (a.d. 1140) : 
— 0/ 'Poo? ol teal ApofiiTat XeyofAevoi. And again, f Po>9 Se ol 
Apo/jLirai <f)6pcovv[AOL, curb 'Pco? tlvos a<j}o8pov htahpajjb6vre<i 
aTrrjxfi/JLaTa rcov ^prjcrafievcov ef viroOrjicqs r)$eofc\vTLa<; twos 
teal virepea^ovTOiV avrov. Apo/jblrat Se, curb rov o|e'&)9 
rpe^ecv avrols Trpocreyevero. 'E/e <yivov<; 8e ratv <i>pd>y>ya)v 
KaOiaravrai. 

S 



lxvi THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

Zeuss compares this with the Norse rds=6p6jjbo<; = race 
(the same word). 
Against it are — 

a. The utter absence of any such name applied to any 
portion of the Norsemen, in any of the numerous Norse 
writings. 

b. Its present power, as the name of so large a country as 
Russia, with so few definite traces of Norse occupancy. 

c. The name Rhoxolani, of a nation between the Don and 
Dnieper. 

The following view is considered to reconcile these diffi- 
culties. 

Previous to the descent on the Euxine and Caspian, the 
Norsemen conquered and occupied the country of the Rhox- 
lanes, and, after they had become known to their neighbours 
as Rhos, harassed the eastern empire. 

In being known to their neighbours by the name of the 
country they occupied, they were like the present Spaniards 
of Mexico. 

The question as to the stock to which those Rhox-lani 
belonged, will bring with it a fact confirmatory of the pre- 
vious view. Although we nowhere find that the Norsemen 
in question themselves called themselves Ros, the Finlanders at 
the present moment call them Ruots-alamen, and their country 
Ruotsi. 

This is a fact which has long been known. It has also 
long been known that -lainen is the regular Finlandic ter- 
mination for gentile nouns. Such being the case, the word 
'Pco^oXavol has long been looked on as a genuine Ugrian 
gloss ; and as Strabo mentions the Rhoxolani, there must 
have been, in his time, not only Ugrians in Russia, but 
Ugrians so near the Euxine as for words of their tongue to 
reach his informants. 

Such I believe to have been the case. I think that there 
were Ugrians as far south as the Lower Danube. This con- 
firms the notion that Russia was not originally Slavonic* 
It also confirms the notion that there were Ugrians in South 
Europe before the Majiar invasion. 

* See Prolegomena, § vi. 



EPILEGOMENA, Ixvii 

Strabo's notice of the Blioxolani is as follows : — 'H o° 
virepKeifxevq iraaa ^mpa tov \e%devTO<? fiera^v Bopvadevow? 
real "larpov, 7rpa)T7) fiiv ecniv rj twv Vercov ip^pjea' eireiTa 
01 Tvptjirat' fieO^ 0D9 ol 'id^vyes ^appbarai, koX ol Baatkeiot 
Xeyo/xevoi, teal Ovpyoi, to fiev nfXeov vofidhe?, oklyoi Se teal 
yea>py[as eTn/jbeXov/jbevoy tovtovs (fiacrl xal irapa tov "laTpov 
ol/ceiv, i(f> ifca,T€pa 7roWdfci<z. 'Pa^oXavol 8' dpKTCKcoTaTOi 
to, fieTa^v tov Tavd'iSo? /cal tov Bopvadevovg vejxo/jbevoi 
rrreSla. 'H yap irpoadptcTio^ irdaa diro Fepfiavias p*e%pi t% 
Kacnrlas rreStdq ecrTiv, fjv Icrfiev virep Se twv 'Va>%oXava>v el 
TLves oIkovo-lv, ovk icr/aev. — Strabo, vii. p. 306. 

From this it follows that modern Russia has taken its 
name, not — ■ 

a. From any dominant Norse conquerors, so-called ; but — 
h. From a portion of its area called Buotsi, originally occu- 
pied by Ugrian Buotsolane, but afterwards by Norsemen 
(chiefly Swedes), to whom the neighbouring nations extended 
the name of the territory. 

In other words, the Northmen of Buotsi were called Bus, 
even as an Angle of Britannia might be called Britannus. 



$> XIX. THE CHATTUARXI. 

The 'Pw? were connected with the Varangi, but, as the 
Varangi were connected with the Franks in name only, the 
two previous sections have been, to a certain extent, epi- 
sodical. 

I. True occupants of Frank localities, and probably true 
members of a Frank confederacy are the Chattuarii. 

This is no Low German form of the word Chas-uarii ; 
although, at the first view, it seems such ; since the single s 
has a less tendency to become t than the double one ; or 
(changing the expression), the High German s most usually 
becomes t in Low German when the vowel that precedes it is 
short. Now, the a in Chas-waxn is long ; since it represents 
the a in name of the river Hase. Hence, Chas-u&ni and 
Chatt-waxn are not in the same relation to each other as 
is to Chatti. 

s 2 



lxviii THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

Like Tacitus, Dion makes no mention of the Chattu-ariL 
Strabo does ; his form being XarTovdpioi,. 
So does Velleius Paterculus ; his form being Attu-avu. 
Ptolemy's XairovcopoL introduce a complication which will 
be noticed in the sequel. 

The locality of the Chatt-uarii of Strabo and Paterculus 
was the watershed of the Ruhr and Lippe. Strabo mentions 
them in conjunction with the Gambrivii, and Paterculus with 
the Bructeri — " Intrata prot.inus Germania, subacti Canine- 
fates, Attuarii, Bructeri, recepti Chei-usci." — ii. 105. 

They increase in historical prominence as we advance ; and 
in the reign of Julian, Ammianus writes " Rheno exinde 
transmisso regionem subito pervasit Francorum quos Attu- 
arios vocaiiC — xx. 10. 

Between the eighth and eleventh centuries the name is 
common, and numerous documents speak of the terra, pagus 
and comitatus of the Chatuarii, Hattuarii, Hazzoarii,* Atu- 
arii, JIattera,f and Hettera, and numerous places are men- 
tioned as lying within it. 

All these lay on the western side of the Rhine, i.e., on 
the Niers, a feeder of the Maas ; so that the minute ethno- 
logist may divide the Attuarii of the middle-age writers into 
the eastern and western branches. 

" In a.d. 715 Saxones vastaverunt terram Cliatuariorum? 
— Annal. S. Amand. Pertz. i. 6. 

But the most interesting fact connected with the Chatt- 
uarii is the occurrence of their native name Hwt-ware in the 
Traveller's Song, and Beowulf. 

The king, whose son, the hero of the great Angle epic, 
Beowulf, succeeded, bore a name the form of which was — 
In a.s., Higelac — 
In Icelandic, Hugleikr — 
In Latin, Chochilaichus ; 
being, variously called, a Dane, a Geat, and an Angle. 

His descent upon one of the pagi of King Theodoric is thus 
mentioned by Gregory of Tours : — " His ita gestis Dani cum 
rege suo, nomine Chochilaicho, evectu navali per mare 

* A near approach to the form Chasuarii. 

t Compare this with Bructeri, as opposed to Boructuarii. 



EPILEGOMENA. lxix 

Gallias appetunt, egressiqne ad terras pagum unum cle regno 
Theodorici devastant atque captivant, oneratisque navibus 
tam de captivis quam de reliquis spoliis reverti ad patriam 
cupiunt. Seel rex eorum in litus residebat, donee naves 
altnm mare comprenderent, ipse deinceps secuturus ; quod 
cum Theodorico nuntiatum fuisset, quod scilicet regio ejus 
fuerit devastata, Theodebertum, filium suum, in illas partes 
cum valido exercitu ac magno armorum apparatu direxit. 
Qui, interfecto rege, hostes navali prcelio superatos opprimit, 
omnemque rapinam terra? restituit.' - ' — iii. 3. 

Now from Beowulf we learn that the pagus of the Franks 
who killed Higelac was that of the Hat- ware. 

In a document of a.d. 769, we find — " Silva quse vocatur 
Heissi, in aquilonari parte fluvii Rurse." 

Later still we find the form Hese, and, at the present 
moment, there is a town called Heis-'mgen, on the right bank 
of the Ruhr, between Essen and Werden.* 

These names, then, as well as that of the town of Essen, 
give us the area of those Germans who were called in Platt- 
Deutsch — 

a. Chatt-narii, or ^4^-uarii. 

b. In High German Hazz-o&n\.-\ 

Whose name also was either compound or simple, i.e., 
Chattuarii or Chatti, Hazzoarii or Hesse ; this latter form 
being preserved in the present form, Essen ; which is High 
German in respect to the ss, but Old Saxon in respect to the 
omission of the initial aspirate. 

In Tacitus (Ann. i. 50, 51) we find a notice of the Silva 
Casia, the locality of the Marsi, and the seat of the worship 
of the dea Tacfana. 

This looks like the name of the country about Essen in its 
oldest forms. 

The connection between the Marsi, Gambrivii, and other 
populations belonging to the Sicambrian division, with the 
Chattuarii, is somewhat doubtful. 

The name may have originated in the root Ctes- of the 
silva Casia, and so have been older than that of the popula- 

* D. S. ii. 620. f But not Has-\ia,ni=Chas-'aimi. 



lxx THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

tion ; a fact indicated by the termination -weere = -uarii = 
-cola in Latin, — Chatt-uarii = Chess-Mam = Casi-colce. 

In this case, Chattuarii is the Low German form of a name 
of the Marsi and others, taken from the forest district they 
occupied, — -just as numerous minor tribes might be called 
Hercynic, or Bacenic, from the Hercynian or Bacenian 
forests. 

But it may also indicate a settlement of intrusive Chatti 
from Hesse, and the name be newer than the population. 

I incline to the former of these views ; still admitting the 
difficulty involved in the fact of populations with names so 
like as Chatt-uav'n (= Cctsi-cola), C%as-uarii (occupants of the 
Hase), and Chatti (occupants of Hesse) being so-called, inde- 
pendent of any special connection. 

The hypothesis that the silva Ccesia was a common rather 
than a proper name, and, as such, one which might occur in 
more districts than one, would solve the difficulty. The 
solution, however, is, at best, but hypothetical. If valid, 
however, Hesse itself might be but a silva Cas-ia, just as 
Burgundy was a Virgunt. 

Llence, the Chattuarii were High Germans or Low Ger- 
mans, according to the view we take of the origin of their 
name. Or they may have been modified High Germans — 
High Germans in origin, but Low Germans in locality, and 
several other characteristics. 

We have seen that, although the word Chatt-uarii is not 
the Low German form for the Chas-uanx of the Hase, it is 
something of the kind. It is the Low German name of the 
Hazz-oarii of Essen, and the parts about that town. 

If Low Germans, they were, probably, Platt-Deutsch 
rather than Saxon, and Frisian rather than Platt-Deutsch — 
the reasoning running thus : — 

a. Their hostility to the Saxons is evidence, as far as it 
goes, for the two populations belonging to different divisions. 

b. The occupants of the Gau Destarbenzon, within the 
Chattuarian area, were Frisians. — " Frisiones qui vocantur 
Destarbenzon." — Annal. Fuld. ad an. 885. Pertz i. 402. 

II. The Attuarii of the Doubs. — In Prolegomena, § xn., it 
was stated that certain Chamavi and Chatt-uarii seem to have 



EPILEGOMENA. Ixxi 

been removed from the lower Rhine to Burgundy, as colo- 
nists, and to have settled on the Doubs. 

From the end of the eighth century downwards, the notices 
of a pagus, and comitatus Attuariorum are numerous, — the 
locality being the valleys of the Vincenne, Tille, and Beze, 
and the neighbouring parts of the water-system of the 
Doubs. 

The pagus Commavorum joined the pagus Attuariorum on 
the Doubs, even as the areas of the Chamavi and Attuarii 
were conterminous on the Lower Rhine. For the numerous 
references to these interesting settlements, see Zeuss, pp. 582 
— 584. They deserve more attention from local antiquaries 
than they have found. 

III. The Xatrovcopot of Ptolemy. — This writer, who says 
nothing about any Chatt-uarii on the Lower Rhine, places a 
population with a name so like it as Xair-ovcopoi, on the part 
between the Upper Rhine and Danube, amongst the Dan- 
duti, Turones, Merovingi, and other widely different sections 
of the Germanic population ; and, to add to the confusion, 
he places Kaa-ovdpot, not very far from Xatr-ovcopot. 

Is this to be put down to erroneous information, and to 
pass as inaccuracy l Probably. At the same time an 
intrusion of Chatti, from the southern portion of their area 
may have taken place, and the name Chassi, or Chasuarii 
{Hazzi or Hazz-oarii) have thus originated. The Low 
German form in -t-, however, is against this view. 

The fact of an inaccuracy is the likelier. 



§ XX. THE SUEVI. 

I. The Suevi of Suabia. — The name of the country called 
Suabia is a true ethnological term, even as Franconia is one. 
The one means the country occupied by the Suevi, the other 
the country occupied by the Franks. Bavaria is another 
such name, derived from the Boii. Saxony is in a similar, 
though somewhat different, predicament. They all, however, 
agree in being names of countries derived from their po- 
pulations, Hesse is, probably, the same, and Thuringia 
also, 



lxxii THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

At what time the name first became an unequivocal 
geographical designation* of what now, in the way of politics, 
coincides with the Grand Duchy of Baden and part of Wur- 
temburg, and, in respect to its physical geography, is part of the 
Black Forest, is uncertain. It was not, however, later than 
the reign of Alexander Severus (ending a.d. 235) — the Ta- 
bula Peutingeriana being supposed to be referable to that 
date. Therein, Alamannia and Suevia appear together — 
as terms for that part of Germany which had previously 
gone under the name of Decumates agri, and the parts about 
the Limes Romanus. 

With this, then, begins the history of the Suevi of Suabia, 
or, rather, of the Suabians. Their alliances were chiefly 
with the Alamanni and Burgundians ; their theatre the Ger- 
man side of France, Switzerland, Italy, and (in conjunction 
with the Visigoths) Spain. Their epoch is from the reign 
of Alexander to that of Augustulus, in round numbers, from 
about a.d. 225 to a.d. 475, a period of two hundred and 
fifty years. 

Their maximum amount of historical prominence was the 
time when Ricimer the Suevian, and Gundobald the Burgun- 
dian, made and unmade such emperors as Severus and Oly- 
brius, the immediate predecessors of Augustulus. 

Now is the time to take a measure of the extent to which 
the notion f that Suev- was no native German term at all, 
but a Keltic name adopted by the Romans, is a paradox, or 
a probable inference from the early notices of the populations 
so-called. 

1. It is not a question whether the root Suev- was Keltic 
or not. It is known to have been so. 

2. Nor is there much doubt about its having been from 
the Gauls that the Romans took it : since it was probably 
Gauls from whom Ceesar learned the names of the allies and 
subjects of Ariovistus. 

* Niebulir mentions an inscription noticing a Victoria Suevica in the 
reign of Nerva. But there is no evidence of this having been a victory 
over the Suevi of Suabia. Caesar's victory over the Suevi of Ariovistus was 
a Victoria Suevica, hut no victory over the people of the Decumates agri. 

f See Prolegomena, § xv. 



EPILEGOMENA. lxxiii 

The only doubt is about its being exclusively Keltic, i.e., 
not German. 

The reason in favour of this view are, perhaps, all referable 
to one head, viz., the facts which the hypothesis will account 
for. Of these the chief are — 

1. The generality of the term, as seen by the express 
evidence of Tacitus himself. 

2. The equally express evidence of Tacitus to the fact of 
a general or common name for the Germans being recent; 
and of that name being Germani — not Suevi. 

3. The difficulty of making it apply to any great divisions 
of the Germanic stock. For such, we have already, in the 
names Ingeevones, Istwvones, and Herminones, more than we 
can easily deal with. 

4. The non-mention of the name Chatti in Csesar, combined 
the high probability of some, at least, of Caesar's Suevi having 
belonged to that branch. 

5. The fact of Tacitus, who places the Chatti in Csesar's 
locality of the Suevi, placing the Suevi to the east of it. 

6. The difficulty of accounting for this by means of a 
migration. Though Ctesar has no mention of the Chatti, 
and Tacitus has, it is not Tacitus who first notices them. 
The name appears in Strabo. Hence, if there were a real 
bodily change of locality on the part of the Suevi, thus 
supposed to have been driven eastwards by the Chatti, the 
displacement must have occurred between the time of Caesar 
and Strabo, i.e., between the time of Julius and Augustus 
Csesar — and that without either the Romans of Gaul or the 
Germans noticing it. 

However, what a migration will not explain, the assump- 
tion of the word Suevi being a synonym to some of the 
previous names will. Suevi may mean Chatti. Suevi may 
mean Hermunduri, or it may (as I believe it does) partially 
coincide with both. 

But what explains the synonym f Nothing better than the 
existence of a second language, especially when that second 
language is no fiction, but a i-eality. 

What lies against this? I will put the only strong argu- 
ment on this side of the question in its strongest form. From 



Ixxiv THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

the middle of the third century* to the present day, the root 
Suab-, or Suev-, has been a native German name for the 
Germans of Suabia. Before this, we hear of Suevi, but their 
locality is not Suabia. 

What does this prove ? That Suev- was a German name 
previously ? By no means. It merely proves that a certain 
area was called by the Romans after a population named 
Suevi, and that certain Germans who settled there took their 
name from the area. Kent, at the present moment, is English, 
and the Kent-ings who occupied part of it during the Anglo- 
Saxon period were English. But does this make Kent an 
English word ? No. It is British = Cant-ium, as is well-known. 

Up to the time in question (i.e., the reign of Alexander), 
the known facts are quite as much against Suev- being a 
German root as in favour of it. Caesar's Suevi are described 
by Gauls, and Tacitus's are in a locality which at one and the 
same time is different from Caesar's, and Slavonic. No one, 
who has realized the extent to which national names vary 
with the language of the informants, will say that the root 
Suev-, as applied to the subjects of Ariovistus, may not be 
as exclusively Gallic, as the word Welsh is exclusively 
Germanic. 

Hence, up to the time in question, Suevia is simply the 
name of the country of a population that the Romans and 
Kelts called Suevi — a population which need not even be 
Germanic, still less, necessarily, call themselves by Suev-. 

* This is allowing the term Suevus, as applied to certain populations and 
individuals (e.g., Ricimer) by the Latin writers, an excessive extension. The 
same authors would have called Hengist, had such a personage been in Rome, 
a Briton. Yet he was no such thing. Such a Cheruscan, too, as the bro- 
ther of Arminius, would also have been called Germanus. Yet such a name 
was strange to the individual himself. Similarly, Englishmen call Prince 
Albert a German, and (perhaps) in speaking English he calls himself so. 
Yet he is a Deutsche. These remarks are necessary, since the reader cannot 
too clearly see that the question is not whether certain Suevi were Germans, 
but whether such Germans called themselves Suevi. However, as the argu- 
ment is put in its strongest form, the objection is not pressed : otherwise 
the truly unexceptionable evidence of Suev- being a German root, begins 
when the Germans of Suabia, unequivocally speaking of themselves, in their 
own lan^uaoe call themselves Suuben. This is much later. 



EPILEGOMENA. Ixxv 

It is when we can find an undoubtedly Germanic popula- 
tion in this country of Suevia calling themselves Suevi, 
that the reasons in favour of its native origin begin to pre- 
ponderate ; since the indigenous use of the name at one time 
is strong prima facie evidence of its indigenous use at 
another. 

Whether, however, it be strong enough to set against the 
series of facts with which the investigation commenced, com- 
bined with the easy explanation of them by the hypothesis 
that the word was originally other than German, is submitted 
to the consideration of the reader. 

All the difficulties are reducible to a single fact, viz., 
that the present undoubtedly German name Suabia has arisen 
out of a Roman rather than a native appellation — the Roman 
name itself having arisen out of a Keltic, the Keltic, perhaps, 
out of a Slavonic. Whoever makes a difficulty of this should 
remember that the word Germany itself is in the same 
predicament. 

But this implies that the ancestors of the present Suabians 
became sufficiently Romanized to take for themselves a national 
name, which the Romans had originally taken from the Gauls 
— a strange name, in short. The following extracts suggest 
the answer to this : — 

" Avitus, on his arrival in Rome, was acknowledged 
emperor ; but Ricimer, a Suevian of royal descent, was now 
all-powerful in the city. All the barbarians, who acted a 
prominent part at Rome, must not be looked upon as savages ; 
they were Christians, and spoke and understood the lingua 
vulgaris, which already resembled the Italian more than the 
Latin ; they were just as civilised as our ancestors in the 
middle ages. A few of them had a shadow of classical edu- 
cation, as Theodoric, the Visigoth, and the younger Alaric : 
but the case was quite different with Ricimer and his equals, 
who no doubt heartily despised the culture of the Romans. 
Those Germans, unfortunately, were not one shade better 
than the effeminate Italians ; they were just as faithless and 
cruel. * * * * Gundobald, king of the Burgundians, 
who had now become patricius, and succeeded Ricimer, pro- 
claimed Glycerius emperor. But the court of Constantinople 



lxxvi THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

sent against him Julius Nepos, likewise a noble Roman, who, 
with some assistance from Constantinople, took possession of 
Rome and Ravenna. Glycerius abdicated ; but Orestes, a 
Rinnan of Noricium, who had risen into importance as early 
as the time of Attila, refused obedience to Nepos. After the 
withdrawal of Gundobald from Italy, Orestes became patri- 
cius, that is commander-in-chief. r> — Niebuhr, Lecture 138. 

The countrymen, then, of Gundobald, at least, were Roman- 
ized ; and that largely. 

1 have said that the undoubted use of the root Suev-,* as 
applied by certain Germans to themselves, is the only strong 
reason against the original wow-Germanic character of the 
word. As others, however, may be satisfied with the fol- 
lowing derivation, it is laid before them : — Swabe, Middle 
High German ; Sudpa, Old High German ; Svafas, Anglo- 
Saxon, are derived from the root swiban = sway, move un- 
steadily; and, hence, JSuevi (or Suebi) is the designation of a 
people of unsteady migratory habits — vt unstdten (schweben- 
den) Lebensweiser — Zeuss, p. 56. 

It cannot be denied that the passage of Strabo confirms 
this view : — Koivbv S' iarlv airacn T049 ravrrj to ire pi ra<; 
p,eTavaaTacrec<; evp,apes, 8cd rrjv XcTorrjra rod /3lov /cal $ia 
to p,r) yecopyelv, fi7]Se ^aavpl^euv, aX\! ev icaXv^LOLS ol/celv 
i<f)i]/jiepov eyovai, irapao-fcevr]w rpocfar) o° airb rcov ^pe/MfiaTcov 
?7 irXeicrri], KaOdrrov Tot9 Nopdaiv war i/ceivovs p,ofxovp,evoL, 
ra ol/cela ralq dpfjbapbd^at<i eVa'pavTe?, oiroi av So^rj, rpe- 
irovrat fierd twv ftoo-fcrj/jbdrcov. Still, I think it unsatisfactory. 

II. The Suevi of Ptolemy. — Ptolemy's Suevi (see text) are 
the 1,ovrf8oi AyyelXoi, to the east of the Lombards, and on 
the middle Jlbis,f and the ^ovr\^oL 2ep,v6ves extending from 
the Albis, to the river Suebus. 

This division introduces a difficulty which even a migration 
will not explain. 

The Suevi of Suabia are High Germans. 

The Ayy elXot ^ovrjSoi can scarcely have been other than 
Angle, i.e., Saxon. 

* Swafas occurs in the Traveller's Song. 

t I write Albis, because the river of the Semnones I believe to have been 
not the Elbe but the Saale. See note in vv. Ex Hermunduris Albis oritur. 



EPILEGOMENA. Ixxvii 

So that whether we assume a movement of the Angle 
Suevi from Suabia, or one of the Suabian Suevi from the 
Angle country, or deduce both from some intermediate area, 
we must assume a change of dialect as well. Zeuss does this ; 
and deriving, as he does, the Suabians from the ancestors of 
the English, believes that the former took a High-Grerman 
dialect in place of their own. Otherwise we may presume, 
English would' be spoken at the present moment in Baden 
and Wurtemburg, — nay, possibly in Switzerland, Bavaria, 
and Austria, since these were Alemanno-Suevic conquests. 

III. The Suevi Transbadani. — Between the Saale, the 
Bode, and Hartz is a Gau named Suevon. This was occupied 
in the sixth century by a population called by the Frank 
writers Suevi. 

The following extracts make them recent colonists, — 
" Tempore illo quo Alboinus in Italiam ingressus est, Ohlo- 
thacharius et Sigibertus Suavos aliasque gentes in loco illo 
posuerunt.*' 1 — Gregory of Tours, v. 15. " Chlotarius et Sigis- 
bertus reges Francorum Suavos aliasque gentes in locis, de 
quibus iidem Saxones exierant posuerunt." — Paul. Diacon.ii. 6. 

If the §§ on the Angli and Werini be now referred to, 
it will be seen that the parts on the Thuringian, Hessian, 
Slavonic, and Saxon frontiers were parts whereon settlements 
appear to have been made to a great extent ; and it must 
be remembered that the evidence here is of the kind called 
cumulative, so that, although absolute and unimpeachable 
reasons for any particular population being considered to 
have originated in a military colony, cannot be given, there 
are several populations contiguous to each other, for each of 
which a small amount of evidence can be collected ; the sum 
of the probabilities being a large one. 

Suevon, then, as the name of a Gau, or pagus, we have 
already seen ; as also localities for the Angli* and the Werini. 

Besides these, there is, in the same parts, a Frisonafeld, or 
field of the Frisians, 

These Suevi of the Gau named Suevon, have been con- 
veniently called the Suevi Transbadani, i. e., the Suevi be- 
yond the Bode ; since the following passage occurs in Witi- 
* See Epilegomena , in vv. 



Ixxviii THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

kind of Corvey (i. p. 634) " Suevi vero Transbadani illam 
quam incolunt regionem eo tempore invaserunt, quo Saxones 
cum Longobardis Italiam adiere, et ideo aliis legibus quam 
Saxones utuntur." 

IV. The Norsavi, or Nordosquavi. — In King Theodobert's 
Epistle to tbe Emperor Justinian we find the name Norsavi 
of which the more correct form is probably Norsuavi, or 
Nordsuavi — " subactis Thuringis . . . Norsavorum gentis nobis 
placata majestas colla subdidit." — Ducherne, i. 862. 

In the Annales Mettenses ad an. 748 (Pertz i. 330), " Pip- 
pinus adunato exercitu per Turingiam in Saxoniam veniens 
fines Saxonum, quos Nordosquavos vocant, cum valida manu 
intravit. Ibique duces gentis asperse Sclavorum in occursum 
ejus venerunt, unanimiter auxilium illi contra Saxones ferre 
parati, pugnatores quasi centum millia. Saxones vero, qui 
Nordosquavi vocantur, sub suam ditionem subactos contritos- 
que subegit." 

Now Zeuss identifies these Norsuavi with the Suevi 
Transbadani ; and, for some time, I followed his view. But 
a little consideration will show that it by no means follows, 
that because the Suevi Transbadani were Suevi in the North 
they were, there, the Nordsuavi. 

A Lincolnshire colony in the East Riding of Yorkshire, 
would certainly be Englishmen North of the Humber, yet 
they would not be North-umbrians. 

I am induced to draw the distinction from the following 
facts : — 

a. All the extracts in Zeuss — the ones on which all my 
knowledge of the subject rests — call those Suevi of whose 
colonial character there is the clearest evidence, — not Nord- 
suavi, but simply Suavi. 

b. The Nordsuavi are spoken of as a gens. 

This seems a sufficient reason for disconnecting — 

a. The Suevi of the settlement founded in Alboin's time 
from the — 

b. Nordsuavi of the gens, conquered by Theodobert. 

The reasoning hitherto has been that the word Suev-, ori- 
ginally Keltic, was applied to the Southern Germans exclu- 
sively, so that it was Keltic in the way that Tshud is Slavonic : 



EPILEGOMENA. lxxix 

which is a name applied not to all wow-Slavonic nations in- 
differently, but to those of the Ugrian stock only.'" — See 
Prolegom. p. xlix. 

But this restriction of its application to a single wow- 
Keltic population is by no means necessary ; since the word 
is quite as likely to be in the predicament of the Germanic 
term Welsh, as in that of the Slavonic Tshud ; the word 
Welsh being applied not only by the English of England 
to their fellow- citizens of the principality, but by the Ger- 
mans of Germany to the Italians of Italy. 

Now what if Suev- be really a root like wealh, i.e., a root 
applicable to two (or more) wow- Keltic populations, indepen- 
dently of their relations to each other, and with reference to 
the wow-Kelticism only ? And what if the second of these 
populations were the Slavonic ? 

If such be the case, more than one difficulty would find its 
solution. 

In the first place, it would account for so many Slavonic 
populations being designated as Suevi. 

In the second, it would supply a plausible origin for the 
word itself. 

The phonetic systems of the Slavonic and Keltic, each so 
peculiar, are each sufficiently different to make such a root as 
Serb, Sorb, or Serv (the native designation of the Slavo- 
nians), take in the mouth of a Gaul, the form Suav, Suab, or 
Suev — and such I believe to have been the case. 

Of course, this view requires to be supported by evidence, 
that the Kelts had a name for the Slavonians at all ; and 
(although the present is not the place where it will be ex- 
hibited) such evidence can be given. The hypothesis also 
requires that this name, as the designation of a wow-Keltic 
population, should have been given to a Slavonic nation first. 
I think that this also can be made probable. If so, we must 
suppose that the south-eastern Gauls, and the most western 
of the Saxon and Thuringian Slavonians once met ; that the 
native Slavonic name Serb took in Gaul the form Suev ; 
that certain Germanic populations displaced those Slavonians, 
and thus came in contact with Kelts ; — lastly, that the name 
* The nora-Slavonic Germans are called Niemaj. 



1XXX THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

originally applied to the Slavonians was extended to the 
Germans as well. 

Be this as it may, it is nearly certain that either the Kelts 
had no collective name for the Serbs, or else, that that name 
was Suev. 

In regard to the details of the populations thus named, I 
believe — 

1. That the Suevi of Ariovistus were chiefly Chatti and 
Cherusci, along with certain Slavonians from Saxony and 
Thuringia, and along with certain Gauls belonging to the 
countries which called him in. 

2. That the Suevi of the Alemannic alliance were the true 
German ancestors of the present Suabians, originally of the 
Germano-Romau frontier, afterwards (by encroachment) of 
the Decumates agri ■ — • subsequent to the fourth century, 
perhaps, calling themselves Suevi, but till then known by 
various special names {Nertereanes, Danduti, Chatti, Burgun- 
dians, &c.) in respect to their ethnology, and in respect to 
their political relations, sometimes Burgundian sometimes 
Alemannic. 

3. That the Suevi Angili of Ptolemy were — 

a. Northern Chatti described by Gallic informants, or — 

b. Angles of the Anglo-Slavonic March, who, being Saxon 
Germans, were known to the Gauls to be different from the 
Chatti, but not known to be different from the Slavonians of 
the Elbe. 

4. That the Saxon Suevi were the same, except that the . 
name Saxon is to be accounted for differently. They occupied 
the country then known as Saxony. 

5. That the Suevi of the Gau {pagus) named Suevon were 
a colony. 

6. That such other Suevi as are mentioned in alliance with 
any undoubted Slavonic nation east of the probable limits of 
the true Alemanno-Suevic conquests (say the bend of the 
Danube) were Slavonians, so designated by some of the more 
eastern Gauls. 

7. That the Suevi of Spain were one of two things : — 

a. Slavonians in alliance with the Silingian Vandals (Sla- 
vonic), or — 



EPILEGOMENA. lxxxi 

b. True German Suevi in alliance with the Visigoths. 
Most probably the former. 

8. That the Suevicum mare was a name for the Baltic, 
wholly unconnected with the root in question, and identical 
with it by accident. 

9. That the Oder was called the fluvius Suebus, because it 
was the river of the Suevi = Sorbs. 

§ XXI. THE CIUUARI. 

In a document quoted by Zeuss as the Weissobrun MS., 
is the name Ciuuari. Zeuss rightly conjectures that the 
Ciuuari were Suevi. Surely, he might have added that the 
word was like Cant-ware, the root Suev + w cere — occupant 
= Suevicola. 

§ XXII. THE ARMALAUSI. 

In the Tabula Peutingeriana the name armalausi occurs 

next to ALEMANNIA. 

It seems safe to say that this is a compound — a compound, 
too, which is Mmso-Gothic in form, and a compound of which 
the -less, in words like thought-^ss, is the latter element. 

The power of the arm- is more equivocal. Zeuss makes it 
mean shirt-sleeves ; so that Arma-lausi = the bare-armed. 

If it were not for the hybridism. I should be inclined to 
translate it, the dis-armed ; the meaning being that some 
frontier population had been prohibited the wearing of 
weapons by its conquerors* But the hybridity of a word 
compounded of the Latin arma + ihe German -los is a grave 
(though not insuperable) objection.* 

As the word occurs nowhere else, the question is curious 
rather than important. 

§ XXITI. THE LENTIENSES AND BRISGAVI. 

The former of these are mentioned by Ammianus in his 
history of the reigns of Constantius and of Gratian ; the 
latter occurs in the Notitia Imperii. 

* See § Ripuarii. 



Ixxxii THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

The interest that attaches to these names arises from their 
being amongst the first members of the Alemanno-Suevic con- 
federacy who are mentioned by specific and particular names. 

Their area of encroachment was Switzerland, and part of 
Bavaria (Helvetia and Rhsetia), so that they are amongst the 
ancestors of the present Swiss. 

The name Bris-gavi shows the antiquity of the word Gau 
=pagus, as in Ar-gau, Thwv-gau. See Kemble's Saxons in 
England — On the Get and Scire. 

§ XXIV. THE BUCCINOBANTES. 

Mentioned by Ammianus ; and differing from the Len- 
tienses and Brisgavi only in having penetrated into Hesse 
— i.e., having made their movements in a northern direction. 

§ XXV. THE BRIGONENSES. 

Germans who, in the fifth century penetrated as far west- 
wards as the neighbourhood of Troyes, and who are men- 
tioned in a Life of St. Lupus, who died a.d. 479. 

Whether these four populations gave their names to the 
localities of which they possessed themselves, or took them 
from them, is uncertain. 

§ XXVI. THE OBII. 

We are now passing from the tribes more especially con- 
nected with the Suevi and Alemanni of the Rhine, to nations 
and confederacies whose scene of action is the Middle and 
Lower Danube. 

The Obii stand at the head of this division. They do so, 
however, because a notice of them is an element in the 
criticism that has to be applied to the Langobards, Heruli, 
and other populations more important. 

The form Obii is from a Greek writer, and occurs in a frag- 
ment of Petrus Patricius : — -Otl AayycSdpScov /cal '0§tW 
i^aKKT^ikiCov "Icrrpov irepaLcoOevTwv, rav irepl Blv8i/ca 
i7T7rea>v e^eXacravTcov icai twv ap,cf)l KdvScSov 7re£eov eiri- 
(p6acrdvTG)v, et<? iravrekr) (favyrjv ol fidpSapoc erpdirovro. 'E0' 



EPILEGOMENA. Jxxxiii 

oh ovro) Trpa^delaiv iv heet KaraaTavre^ etc irpoJTr) 1 ? eiri- 
^eip?ere&)? oi /3dp£apoi,, Trpea&eis irapa KlXiov Bdcrcrov t-tjv 
TlaLovlav 8ce7rovra ariWovai, BaXXo/xapiov re rbv ftaaiXea 
M.apKo/jbdvv(t)v /cal erepovs heica, tear eOvos iiriXe^ajxevoi eva. 
Kal op/cotg tt)v elprjvqv ot, irpeaQeLs Tricrrcoad/Mevoi ot/caSe 
yoapovcriv. 

The Greek source is important ; since, in Greek, the b 
may have been sounded as v ; so that word may have been 
Ovii to the ear. 

Two other facts must be added : — 

1 . That forms like Attuarii, as opposed to Chattuarii, show 
the likelihood of an initial cli having been lost. 

2. That most German national names could end either in 
-n, or in a vowel — Seaxe and Seaxan, &c. 

Putting all this together we find that the following legiti- 
mate changes may give us Obii, Ovii, Oviones, Chaviones, 
Aviones — this latter being a population we have met with 
before, in the north. 

Now few nations, during the time of their historical 
prominence, were in closer political relations with the Lango- 
bardi than the Heruli — and with the Chaviones the Heruli 
were in close political relation also : — " Cum omnes barbarse 
nationes excidium universse Gallise minarentur, neque solum 
Burgundiones et Alamanni, sed et Chaviones M-ulique, viribus 
primi barbarorum, locis ultiini, prsecipiti impetu in has pro- 
vincias irruissent, quis deus tarn insperatam salutem nobis 
attulisset, nisi tu adfuisses ? — Chaviones tamen JjJrulosque 
. . aperto Marte, atque uno impetu perculisti, non universo ad 
id proelium usus exercitu, sed paucis cohortibus. — Ita cuncti 
Chaviones, EruHque cuncti tanta internecione csesi interfec- 
tique sunt, ut exstinctos eos relictis domi conjugibus ac matribus 
non profugus aliquis proelio, sed victorias tuee gloria nuntiaret." 
— Mamertini Paneg. Maximiano Aug. dictus (an. 289), c. 
5. " Laurea ilia Rhaetica et ilia Sarmatica te, Maximiane, 
fecerunt pio gaudio triumphare. Itidem hie gens Chavionum 
Erulorumqae deleta, transrhenana victoria et domitis oppressa 
Francis bella piratica Diocletianum votorum compotem i-eddi- 
derunt." — Ejusd. Paneg. Genethl. Maxim. Aug. diet. (an. 
291), c. 7. 

t 2 



lxxxiv THE GERMANY OE TACITUS. 

Taking this statement as I find it, 1 admit that the 
Chaviones, a nation of northern Germany, may be brought as 
far south as the Danube. 



§ XXVII. THE LANGOBARDI OF LOMBARDY. 

The first notice of these is that of Petvus Patricius. — See 
§ Obii. 

Then, after a long silence as to their acts, they appear on 
the middle Danuhe, with the (so-called) traditions of Paulas 
Diaconus (See Epilegomena, § vi.), as the Lombards of 
Lombardy. 

A shade of doubt (and to my mind it is a deep one) lies 
in the fact of their previous name having been Winili, a form 
suspiciously like Venedi. Still they are at least (if Slavonians) 
Slavonians who, by the time they became the Lombards of 
Lombardy, were thoroughly Germanized. 

Their descent from the Lango-bards of Tacitus and 
Ptolemy is a difficult question. Their locality in Rugiland 
proves nothing : it is probably the land of the Rugii of the 
Danube — not that of the Rugii of Tacitus. 

Golandia has been supposed to be GW^-landia (=Goth- 
land) ; but we must take the reading as we find it — especially 
as there was a Lithuanic nation called Galinda. 

The terminations -aib in Bant-aib and Wurgond-aib have 
been supposed to be the German -eib : concerning which Mr. 
Kemble, after explaining a word often mentioned in the 
present pages * (Gau), adds, in a note, that the synonym Eib 
is less common. 

* " Next in order of constitution, if not of time, is the union of two or 
three marks, in a federal bond for purposes of a religious, judicial or even 
political character. The technical name for such a union is, in Germany, a 
Gau or Bant ; in England the ancient name Ga has been almost universally 
superseded by that of Scir, or Shire. For the most part the natural divisions 
of the county are the divisions also of the Ga ; and the size of this depends 
upon such accidental limits, as well as upon the character and dispositions 
of the several collective bodies, which we have called Marks. 

" The Ga is the second and final form of unsevered possession, for every 
larger aggregate is but the result of a gradual reduction of such districts, 



EPILEGOMENA. lxxxv 

But is this the only analysis of the two words — Banthaib 
and Wurcondaib ? I think not. The commonest of all the 
terminations of the towns of Dacia was dava — Rusi-«fam, &c, 
as may be seen by going no further than ArrowsmitlTs map. 

Again, Bantaib is admitted by Zeuss to mean the -taib (or 
-aib) of the Slavonic Antes.* As for the root Wurcond, it 
is, at least, as likely to represent the Urugund- in Urugundi, 
as the Burg- in the true Burgundians. 

To all this must be added the remarks in the note in 
v. Longobardi, suggesting that from the fact of the term 
being an epithet rather than a separate substantive name, 
there is a likelihood of there having been more Longobards 
than one, and that independent of ethnological affinity. 

Upon the whole, although the evidence of the Lombards 
having originally been Goths or Germans, and the evidence of 
their having effected a migration from north to south, are 
not wholly unexceptionable, less objections lie against them 
than against any other similar instance : and I only con- 
sider it doubtful when it is made the basis of any ulterior 
deductions — such as that of making some very doubtful Ger- 
mans German, because they stood in certain relations to the 
Lombards of Lombardy. 

Perhaps the structure of the Lombard armaments may 
have been like that of the Vandals, — German in respect to 
its chiefs, Slavonic in respect to the bulk of the forces ; in 
which case the Langobardi may have been the analogues of the 
Astingi; in which case, too, they may have represented the 
Langobardi of Tacitus. The distant migration of a cogna- 
tio or silscea/t seeking war, is more likely than the distant 

under a higher political or administrative unity, different only in degree, 
and not in kind from what prevailed individually in each. 

" The kingdom is only a larger Ga than ordinary, indeed the Ga itself 
was the original kingdom. But the unsevered possession or property 
which we thus find in the Ga is by no means to he considered in the 
same light as that which has heen described in the Mark. The inhabitants 
are settled as Markman, not as Gamen ; the cultivated land which lies 
within the limit of the larger community is all distributed into smaller 
ones." — Saxons in England, vol. i. 73. 

* Probably, an eastern form of the word Wend. 



IXXXV1 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

migration of a nation, broken up and weakened, as we know 
the northern Lombards to have been. 



$> XXVIII. THE GEPID.E. 

The Gepidse are mentioned in the Traveller's Song as GifJ>as. 

Their date and area are those of the Heruli and Longobards. 

The tradition and the gloss Gepanta may be seen in 
Jornandes, Epilec/omena, § v. 

In Capitolinus we find notice of the Si-cobotes in the reign 
of Marcus Antoninus, as members of the Marcomannic con- 
federacy in the Marcomannic war. This has been supposed 
to = Gepidee + the prefix Si- (or Sig-), just as was supposed 
to be the case with $i-cambri. 

Vopiscus, in his Life of Probus first mentions Gepidee — 
•■ Cum et ex aliis gentibus plerosque pariter transtulisset, 
id est ex Gepidis, Grautungis et Vandalis, ill 1 omnes fidem 
fregerunt.'" — Prob. c. 18. 

Mamertinus mentions their wars with the Tervings. ■ More 
important, however, were their political relations with the 
Longobards, the Avars, and the Thaifal. 

Their seat was the Middle Danube, in Dacia ; their chief 
King, Fastida, a name by no means unequivocally German 
or Gothic. 

Arda-ncA, another chief, has a more unequivocal name. 

Jornandes separates them from the Winidse — " In qua 
Scythia prima ab occidente gens sedit Gepidarum, quae 
magnis opinatisque ambitur fluminibus. Nam Tisianus per 
aquilonem ejus corumque discurrit. Ab africo vero magnus 
ipse Danubius, ab euro fluvius Tausis secat, qui rapidus 
ac verticosus in Histri fluenta furens devolvitur. Introrsus 
illi Dacia est ad coronas speciem arduis Alpibus emunita, 
juxta quorum sinistrum latus . . . Winidarum natio populosa 
consedit." — C. 5. 

The parts about Singidunum and Sirmium are their most 
definite localities. 

They afterwards became subject to the Huns. 

An unknown writer of the ninth century says, " De Ge- 
pidis autem quidam adhuc ibi resident.'''' 



EPILEGOMENA. Ixxxvii 

Procopius makes them Goths ; but his language may apply 
to their political relations, besides which, he connects them 
with the Vandals, and says that they were originally called 
Sauromatce and Melanchleeni — TorQuca edvrj iroXXa [xev teal 
dXXa irpoTepov re r)v ical ravvv ecni, rd Se 6V/ iravrmv 
fteyto-Ta re ical d^toXoycoTara TorOot re elat ical BavSiXot 
teal Oviaiyordot ical r/]7rat8e$. UdXat pbhrot ^avpopbdrat 
koX MeXdy^Xatvot eovopudtpvTO' elcrl 8e o't ical Yertfcd eOvq 
ravr itcdXovv. OvTot diravre^ ovopacrt ptev dXXrjXcov Sta- 
(pepovaiv, wcrrrep ecprjrat, aXX(p he tcov irdvrcov ovSevl 
StaXXdaaovcrt. Aevtcol yap airavTes rd crdypbard re elcri teal 
t«? /copras gavdol, evpurjiceis re ical dyaOol t«9 otyets, koI 
vopuots p,ev Toi§ avrois yptovrcu, opboiws Se rd £9 tov Qebv 
avrois 7](XKr]rai. Ttjs yap Apetov 86^779 elcrtv airavres, epeovt] 
re at/rots icrn ptla, TotOlkt} Xeyopuevq, teal pboi Sokovv it; ej/09 
puev elvat enravres to TraXaibv edvovs, bvopuaai he. varepov 
twv e/cd<TToi<; y)yr)crapieva>v hcaiceKpladai. — Bell. Vandal, i. 2. 
IJoXXqi he diroOev (t^9 MatcoTthos) TotOol re ical OvlcriyorOot 
ical BavoiXot teal rd aXXa TorOttcd yevq gvfnravra ihpvvro. 
—Bell. Goth. iv. 5. 

He adds, too, '2tcippov<s re ical 'AXavo U9 ical aXXa YbrOtica 
eOvrj. — Bell. Goth. i. 1. Now the Alans were, assuredly, 
no Goths in ethnology. See § Alani. 

The evidence, then, in favour of their being Goths or 
Germans, is that of so many others. Their alliances, and the 
names of some of their leaders, along with a (so-called) tra- 
dition are in their favour ; their locality against them. So 
is the gloss Gepanta. So is the express evidence of Procopius. 

§ XXIX. THE THAIFALJ3. 

These are first mentioned by Mamertinus, a.d. 291 : their 
locality being on the Middle Danube, and their chief political 
relations with the Thervings, Vandals, Gepidce, Ostro-Goths, 
and Limigantes. 

Zosimus, an indifferent authority, makes them Scythians : 
— F,7reX66vTO)v he ©aicpdXcov, 2/cv0ticov yevovs, Irnrevat 
TrevraKocriot^, ov ptovov ovtc avrerd^aro rovrots, dXXd ical to 
ttoXv ttjs hvvdpbew; aTroGaXoov, teal to pe^pi tov ydpatcos 



Ixxxviii THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

auTOu? XTjt^ofxevovi ISebv, ayaTnjTfOS airohpas Stecrwdr). — 
ii. 34. 

The name of one of their chiefs is Farnobius, a name of 
doubtful origin ; but as Ammianus expressly calls him a 
Goth, he must be considered as such: — " Hanc (Frigeridus) 
Gothorum optimatem Farnobium cum vastatoriis globis vagan- 
tem licentius occupavit, ducentemque Taifalos, nuper in socie- 
tatem adhibitos : qui, si dignum est dici, nostris ignotarum 
gentium terrore dispersis, transiere flumen direpturi vacua 
defensoribus loca." — xxxi. 9. 

" Beatus Senoch, gente Theiphalus, Pictavi pagi, quem 
Theiphaliam vocant, oriundus fuit 11 (Vitas Patrum 15), sug- 
gests the presence of Thaifali in France. If so, a settlement 
as a military colony would best explain it. 

Infamous for their unnatural habits (which they shared 
along with the Heruli), they are described by Ammianus in 
the following passage : — "Hanc Taifalorum gentexa turpem ac 
obsccense vita? flagitiis ita accepimus mersam, ut apud eos 
nefandi concubitus fcedere copulentur maribus puberes, setatis 
viriditatem in eorum pollutis usibus consumturi. Porro si 
qui jam adultus aprum exceperit solus, vel interemerit ursum 
immanem, colluvione liberatur incesti." 

They were probably Slavonic ; the phal- being the -hal- 
in Yicio-halL and the -vol in Nahar--y<z?«. 



§ XXX. THE VANDALS. 

The reasons in favour of the Vandals being considered 
German, are — 

1. Authors so respectable as Pliny (the first writer who 
mentions them) and Tacitus, place them under the term Ger- 
mani. 

2. Their chief political connections are with the undoubtedly 
German Alemanno-Suevi, and Goths proper. 

3. The names of their leaders are almost exclusively Ger- 
man — Gonde-Hc, Gense-nV, &c. 

The value of the first of these facts is questioned in almost 
every page of the present volume. 

The second is neutralized by such extracts as the following 



EPILEGOMENA. Ixxxix 

— which connect them with the equally unequivocally Sarma- 
tian Jazyges ; — 73-/309 Se ical, Xva fjbrjTe toZ<? 'Ia£i>£t, [xr)T€ rots 
Bovppots, fjbrjre TOt<? BavS^Xot? TroXefAwcriv. — DioCass. lxxii. 
p. 1204, Reim. 

The third is a really substantia] reason, and would be valid 
if there were nothing to set against it. 

Against it, however, stand, — 

1. The name of the people themselves, which is pro- 
bably a South-German form of the well-known root, 
V-nd, applied by the Germans in general to the Slavonians 
in general. 

2. The localities. In no part of the true and undoubted 
Germanic area do we meet with any form of the root V-nd-l, 
and no where do we find the mention of them as Germanic, 
other than cursory and incidental. Neither Pliny nor Tacitus 
gives us more than the name. 

3. The different points of the Roman frontier, upon which 
we meet with Vandals, are so distant, as make it likely that 
the population, known by the name Vandal, was of great 
extent ; whilst great extent on the part of a population is 
prima, facie evidence of the name being general. 

Hence, I believe that the Venedi of the Germans of the 
Baltic, were the Vand-ali of the Germans of the Danube, 
and vice versa. 

Of these Slavonic populations, thus known under a Ger- 
man name, the two most important were — 

1. The Vandals of the Daco-Pannonian frontier, whose 
scene of action was the Middle and Lower Danube, whose 
political relations were with the Goths proper, and who first 
became formidable to the Romans under their German name 
during the Marcomannic war. The ethnological affinities of 
these were more specially with the Lygii, and their present 
representatives are the more southern branches of the Poles, 
along with some of the more northern Slovaks. 

2. Vandals of the south-western frontier. — Those, more 
important than the others, were the Sorabians of Saxony, 
Silesia, and the more eastern parts of Thuringia and Fran- 
conia ; i.e., the Slavonians of the Upper Maine, the Upper 
Elbe, and the Saale, their scene of action being in the first 



XC THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

instance Gaul, subsequently Spain, finally Africa ; their poli- 
tical relations being with the Suevi, Alemanni, Burgundians, 
and the southern Franks. Their ancestors were some of the 
Suevi of Tacitus, more especially the Semnones ; their de- 
scendants the present Sorbs of Saxony and Silesia. 

The statement of Idatius in Chronicon Roncallense is, 
that the Vandals of Spain (Andal-usian Spain more particu- 
larly) were Wandali Silingi. These are admitted by Zeuss 
to have been the ScXtyyai of Ptolemy ; as well as to have 
been the occupants of parts so near Silesia as Upper Lusatia 
(p. 445). 

Again, the pagus ^7-ensis is admitted to be a Latin form 
of the Slavonic Zlas-ane and Sleens-ane, the older forms 
of the present German Schles-ien, and English Sil-esia 
(p. 663). 

Yet the similarity between all these forms, and the 
name ZlXtyy-at, (applied to the same locality) is not ad- 
mitted. 

Admitting it myself, I consider the Vandals of Andal-usia, 
the Vandals of Genseric, and the Vandals of Gelimer to 
have been no Germans, but Slavonian Serbs, chiefly from 
Saxony, but in some cases from parts so far east as Si- 
lesia, in which country, the Vandals of the south-western 
frontier may have come in contact with those of the south- 
eastern. 

This shows that the separation between the two branches 
of the Wandals must not be carried too far ; indeed, we 
are at liberty to take Silesia as a central point, and look 
upon the movements of the Vandals, whose alliance was with 
the Goths, and the Vandals, whose alliance was with the 
Alemanni, as blows against the majesty of Rome struck right 
and left by the same people. 

At any rate, the Germanic leaders of each belonged to one 
and the same cognatio of sibsceaft ; the Vandal equivalent to 
the J$a\t-ungs of the Visi-goths, and the Amal-ungs of the 
Ostro-goths, being the Ast-ings, a name which we have in 
two forms one Moeso-Gothic, and one Old High German. 

In the Old High German the s or 2 of the Moeso-Gothic 
becomes -r ; e.g., the comparative degree in r, which in 



EPILEGOMENA. XC1 

English is sweet-er and in Old High German snats-iro, was, 
in Mceso-Gothic, sut-iza. So also the Old High German 
plint-<?r ( = blind = csec-ws) is in Moeso- Gothic blind-s. 

In like manner, these Ast-ings, when they are at the head 
of those Vandals, whose chief alliance was with the Goths, 
are designated by the form in -s, the Gothic forms being 
Azd-ing-6s ; whereas, when they command the Vandals of 
Andalusia and Africa, the Vandals, whose alliance was with 
the Alemanni, Suevi, Burgundians, and other High German 
populations, they are Gar-ding-s, the Old High German form 
being Gar-ding-ar. 

The reasons for considering Asting (Garding) to have been 
the name of a family, lie in the following extracts. 

" Si inter Hasdirigorum ( Hasdingorum 9) stirpem retinuis- 
setis Amali sanguinis purpuream dignitatem.'" — Cass. Var. ix. 1 . 

TeXi/xepa avrov avv tol? evBo^ois rov eOvovs, ou? iicakovv 
'Ao-Tityyov? ol fidp§apoi. — Lydus de Magistrat. p. 248. 

" Belisarius Gunthimer et Gebamundum Gardingos regis 
fratres perimit."" — Chron. Roncall. ii. 364. 

" Viclentibus cunctis sacerdotibus Dei, senioribusque palatii 
atque Gardingis?'' — Legg. Wisigoth. lib. n. tit. i. 1. 

" Sen sit dux aut comes, thiufadus aut vicarius, Gardingus 
vel quselibet persona/ 1 — Lib. ix. tit. ii. 8. 

" Si majoris loci fuerit persona, id est dux, comes, sive etiam 
Gardingus. 1 ' 1 — Lib. ix. tit. ii. 9. 

" Secundus est canon de accusatis sacerdotibus, seu etiam 
optimatibus palatii atque Gardingis^ — Lib. xn. tit. i. 8. 

" Benedicta claro genere exorta atque ex Gardingo regis 
sponsa." — Vita Sanct. Fructuosi (Mabill. Seec. ii. 587.) 

The chief passage that modifies this view, is the fol- 
lowing from Dion Cass. lxxi. "Aariyyoi Be, &v c Pao? re 
koI r Pa7TTO? rjiyovvro, rjXOov jxev e? tvjv Aa/ciav oIktj- 
crat, iXiriBi, rov ical j^prj/jbara Kal %d>pav eVt avfifjua^lq 
\r/ilreo~8ar [Jbrj TVfcovres Be avrwv, TrapetcareOevTO to? <yvval- 
fcas Kal tou? rratBas ra> K\rjp,evri, &)? Kal ttjv twv Kocrrov- 
§a>fCG)v yjsapav toIs 6irXot<; Kriqab^evoi' viKiqaavre^ Be e'/eet- 
vou? Kal tt)V AaKtav ovBev tjttov eXvirovv. Aelo-avTes Be ol 
AdyKpifyoL, p,rj ical 6 K\7]fir/<; cpo&rjdels, crcpas 69 tyjv yfjv* 



XC11 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

r)v avrol kvcpKovv, ecraydyg, eireOevro avTOis fir) TrpoaBe^o- 
ixevois /cal tto\v e/cpdrrjaav • (bare /JurjSev ere 7ro\e/juov tov<{ 
'Ao-Tiyyovs 7rpo9 tovs ^Vcajjualov^ irpa^ai, ttoWcl Be Sr) rov 
Mdp/cov iKerevcravTas, ^p/jfiard re irap" avrov \aj3elv kcli 
X^pav ye diraLrrjo-cu, dv ye rt kclkov tou? Tore 7ro\efiovvrd<; 
ol SpdaGocn. Kal ovtoi fiev eirpagdv n &V vireo-xovro. 

This, however, can be reconciled with previous passages, by 
considering the Asting-as (or Gardingar) to have been a free 
company, recruiting itself on Slavonic ground, so much so 
as to form the Germanic nucleus to what was really a Vandal 
(or Slavonic) force. 

The Lacr-ings, mentioned also by Dion, may have been 
similar adventurers. 

Hence the names Genseric, &c, are the names of Astings 
(or Gardings) ; and the German blood amongst the Vandals 
was limited to the cognat'w or silsceaft of their German 
leaders ; and the Vandals are German only so far as they 
are Astings — which is only very partially. 



§ XXXI. THE RUGII. 

The pugnax Hugus is mentioned by Sidonius Apollinaris : 

Barbados totas in te transfuderat arctos, 
Gallia, pugnacem Rugum comitante Gelono ; 
Gepida trux sequitur, Scirum Burgundio cogit : 
Chuiius, Bellonotus, Neurus, Bastema, Toringus, 
Bructerus, ulvosa quern vel Nicer abluit unda, 
Prorumpit Francus. — Carm. vii. 320. 

They first appear prominently in history about a.d. 475 ; 
their area being the parts on each side of the Middle Danube ; 
their chiefs Flaccitheus, Feletheus, Fava, and Frideric, the 
last two of whom are deposed by Odoacer, the great central 
point in the ethnology of the Eugii, and the three forthcoming 
populations :* — " Quapropter rex OtacharBugis intulit bellum, 
quibus etiam devictis, et Fridericho fugato, patre quoque Fava 
capto, eum ad Italiam cum noxia conjuge supra memorata, 
videlicet Gisa, transmigravit. Post audiens idem Odachar 

* Heruli, Turcilineri, andSciri. 



EPILEGOMENA. XC1U 

Friderichum ad propria revertisse, statim fratrem suum raisit 
cum multis exercitibns Aonnlfum, ante quem denuo fugiens 
Friderichus, ad Theodoricum regem, qui tunc apud Novam 
civitatem provincial Moesias morabatur, profectus est." — Eugipp. 
c. 45. "AdunatisOdoachar gentibus, quae ejus ditioni parebant, 
. . venit in Rugiland, pugnavitque cum Rugis, ultimaque 
eos clade conficiens, Feletheum insuper eorum regem (qui et 
Feva dictus est) extinxit. Vastataque omni provincia, 
Italiam repetens, copiosam secum captivorum multitudinem 
abduxit.'" — Paul. Diac. i. 19. 

Naturally hostile to the usurper Odoacer, the Rugii join 
Theodoric the Ostrogoth, and, in the reign of Justinian, we 
hear of Rugii in Italy, distinct in many points from the Goths, 
— 'AcplicovTO (viz., the Heruli) e<? ywpav, § Srj 'Poyol to 
iraXatov coktjvto, o'l tco TotOwv crrparS) avap.i%6evT€<; e? 
J lra\lav e^aprjcrav. — Proc. B. Goth. ii. 14. Ot Be 'Voyol 
ovtol e6vo$ ixev elat TotOckov, avTovopbol re to iraXaibv 
i§lcov. GevSepfyov 8e avrovs to kclt a/3%«9 irpocreTaiptaa- 
puevov %vv aWois tlctIv Wveacv, e<? re to 761/0? aireKeicpiVTO 
Kal %i)v avTOts e? tovs Tro\epbiovs airavTa eirpaao-ov. 
Tvvai^l pbkvToi m? rjiciaTa eiripbL'yvvpbevoL aWoTplais, aicpai- 
(pvicri rralBcov Bt,a8o%ai<; to tov edvovs ovopua iv afplacv 
avTols Sieo-cticravTo.— Id. iii. 2. 

Now the RugiA&nd of these Rugii was on the Danube. 
What connects them with the Rugii of Tacitus ? 

a. The similarity of name. 

o. The account of Jornandes. 

Jornandes. writes that the Goths expelled the Ulm-erugi : — 
" Mox promoventes (scil. Gothi) ad sedes ZT/merugorum qui 
tunc Oceani ripas insidebant, castra metati sunt, eosque com- 
misso proelio propriis sedibus pepulerunt." The form Ulm-e- 
rugi indicates a Gothic rather than a Latin, a homesprung 
rather than an exotic legend. It is a compound of the 
Scandinavian holm=holm=jlat land by a river, lake, or sea, 
and is exactly the form Holmrygir of Snorro. 

Whatever these Rugii were in respect to their ethnology, 
the names of some of their chiefs (e.g., Frideric) were 
German. 



XC1V THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

They were also in geographical contact with the undoubt- 
edly Germanic Ostrogoths, as well as with the Langobardi. 

But then we have the expression, Turc-ilingus sive Rugius. 

The ethnology of the Rugii, Heruli, Scirl, and Turdlingi is 
best considered after all these have been treated in detail. 



J XXXII. THE HERULI. 

The first historical actions of a population named Heruli 
are referred to the reign of Claudius. 

But the authors who do this are not contemporary with the 
events related. 

This, however, is not important. Mamertinus, writing 
about a.d. 289, is so. See extract in § Obii. 

Zozimus connects them with the Peucini and Goths: — 
'E/e twv 7rpo\a§ovacov eirapdevTes (soil. 2,Ku6at) e(p6&a)v, 
'EpovXovs Kal Ylevfca? Kal YotOovs TrapaXaSovres Kal irepl tov 
Tvpav iroTap,ov d0poia6evT€<;, . . eirkeov eVl to irpoaoi. 

Syncellus makes Greece and Thrace their theatre of war : 
— Tore Kal AtpovXoi irevT a koglcu? vavcrl Sid r>)<? MaiwrtSo? 
\tfjbV7)$ eVt rbv Hovtov hiairXevo-avTe^, to Bv^dvTiov Kal 
Xpvo-oTroXiv KaTe\a§ov . . . Kal et? ttjv Attiktjv (p0dcravT€$ 
eyuTrncpoio-i Ta? AOrjvas, Kopivdov Te Kal ^irdpTrjv Kal to 
'Apyos Kal TrjV oXtjv Aya'tav KaTeSpa/xov . . totg NavXo&aTO? 
6 tcov Alpov\a>v r]yovp,€vo<; TaXirfva) tu> fiao-tXel Sovs eavTOV 
€kSotov, v7raTLKrj<> rj^Lcodrj ti/jltj? Trap" avTOv. — Chronograph. 
p. 382, edit. Par. 

Jornandes makes them become subjected to Hermanric: — 
" Non passus est nisi et gentem Herulorum, quibus prseerat 
Alaricus, magna ex parte trucidatam, reliquam suae subigeret 
ditioni. Nam prsedicta gens (Ablavio historico referente) 
juxta Maotidas paludes liabitans in locis stagnantibus, quas 
Grasci hele vocant, Heruli nominati sunt : gens quanto wlox, 
eo amplius superbissima. Sed quamvis velocitas eorum ab 
aliis ssepe bellantibus eos tutaretur, Gothorum tamen stabili- 
tati subjacuit et tarditati." — De Eeb. Get. xxiii. 

The commentary upon Jornandes" etymology is the follow- 
ing note in the Etymologia Magna:- — r 'E\ovpos. Evdela. 



EPILEGOMENA. XCV 

Airb twv efcel<JG ektov "EXovpoc iciiekr]VTai. Ael;i,7r7ro<; iv 
ScoSe/cara) %poviKmv. Kal <ypd<berai 8/,a tov e tyiXov. 

In the reign of Augustulus they became formidable, and 
Odoacer, the king of the Heruli, and the centre of the group 
of B/ugii, Turcilingi, and Sciri, shares the historical pro- 
minence of Theodoric, Attila, Clovis, and the other great 
conquerors of that century. 

Not that their relations were thus limited. Besides, the 
Chaviones (for which see § Obii) of Mamertinus, Ammianus 
mentions JEruli and Eruli in alliance with the Batavi, and 
more than one author carries their maraudings as far as 
Spain : — " De Erulorum gente septem navibus in Lucensi 
litore aliquant! advecti, viri ferme cccc. expediti, superventu 
multitudinis congregate duobus tantum ex suo numero effu- 
gantur occisis : qui ad sedes proprias redeuntes, Cantabriarum 
et Varduliarum loca maritima crudelissime deprsedati sunt." — 
Idatii Chron. ad a.d. 455. 

Their first appearance, then, in history, takes place on the 
Lower Danube, if not on the Lower Don, and the Pal us 
Meeotis. 

Their physiognomy is thus described by Sidonius : — 

" Hie giaucis Herulus genis vagatur, 
Imos Oceani colens recessus, 
Algoso prope concolor profundo." 

The glauc<z gena is a (so called) Mongolian character. 

Procopius gives the following remarkable account of a 
Herulian migration : — e Hvuca "EpovXot Awyyo&apSwv rjaarj- 
Oevreqry j^d^j) e 'f V^wv t8)V Trarpioyv ear^crav, ol fiev avrwv, 
wairep ,aot epbTrpoaOev SeSwi'yrjTai, m/ojo-avro e? ra iv 'lWt>- 
pwi<? ywpia, ol 8e Srj aWot "IcrrpGV irorafiby SiaSalveiv 
ovSapbT] ejvmaav, aXA.' e? avra? irov rds e'er^arta? ttjs oIkov- 
fievrjs ISpvaavro' ovtgs <yovv ttoWoov etc rod /SaacXelov 
ai[xaro^ rjjovfjbevoyv a^lcriv rj/Jbei^av fiev ret 'SkXccStjvow Wvr\ 
i(f)e%rj$ arrravTa, ep'rjjjuov 8e yji>pav 8ia8dvT6<; iv6evSe 7ro\\r)v 
6? tou9 Ovdpvov; KaXovjJLevovs iyrjdpiqo-av. Meff ovs Sr) teal 
Aavoiv ra edvrj irapiSpafiov, ov /3ia£ojj,evQ)v <x<£a9 twv ry8e 
/3ap§dpo)v. 'EvOivSe re e'9 cotceavbv dtyitco/jbevoi ivavriXXovro, 
&ov\y re irpoo")(pvre<i t$ vqerm avrov epbetvav . . . (QovXt- 



XCV'i THE GERMANY OF TACITUS- 

roiv) eOvos ev iroXvavOpoinrov ol Tavroi elai, Trap ov<f Bij 
"'EpovXcov rore ol errr/Xi/rat IBpvaavro. — Procop. Bell. Goth, 
ii. 15. 

The Heruli had also political relations with the Gepidse. 



J XXXIII. THE BRENTI. 

The notice of this name arises out of that of the Heruli. 

In the reign of Justinian, and in the war against Narses, a 
certain Sinduala (Sindewald, SivEovaX, ~2ivBova\Bo<i) is men- 
tioned as king (^jefioiv, o-rpdrriyos, tyrannus) of the Eruli. 

The same is mentioned as a rex Brentorum — " Habuit 
Narses certamen adversus Sinduald Brentorum regem, qui 
adhuc de Herulorum stirpe rernanserat, quern secum in Italiam 
veniens simul Odoacar adduxerat." — Gest. Lang. ii. 3. 

The name occurs nowhere else. 

§ XXXIV. THE TURCILINGI. 

The first writers that mention this people are Jornandes 
and Paulus Diaconus. 

They first appear in history in the reign of Augustulus. 

Their political relations are with the Heruli, Rugii, and 
Sciri ; Odoacer being the chief that forms the centre of the 
confederation. 

Their areas of action are the parts between the Danube 
and Italy. 

Their name is a German in form ; the -ling belonging to 
that language. 

The radical part, however, is neither German nor Slavonic. 

The Huns, a Turk population, are already beginning to 
appear in Europe. 

Can these Turci-lingi be Turks ? 

This is partly answered in § Sciri, and partly elsewhere. 

§ XXXV. THE SCIRI. 

Respecting the Sciri, even Grimm is not prepared to 
say more than that if they were not Gothic, they were con- 



EPILEGOMENA. XCVli 

nected with the Goths in many points — "Wo nicht Gothischen, 
doch mit den Gothen in vielfacher beruhrung , . ,, — D. S. i. 
p. 465. 

Pliny's evidence is the earliest. He places them on the 
Baltic rather than elsewhere. " Nee minor opinione Eningia. 
Quidam ha?c habitari ad Vistulam fluvium a Sarmatis, 
Venedis, Sciris, Hirris, tradunt." 

The first complication here occurring, is the similarity of 
the names Hirri and Sciri. Strange that really different 
populations, with names so alike, should occupy contiguous 
localities. No other writer mentions the Hirri, and I think 
they are but Sciri under another name — i.e., a name taken 
from a different dialect. 

Neither does any other writer place any Sciri in the north. 

The Olbian Inscription mentions the ~2icLpoi, along with 
the TdXarac. 

Stephanus Byzantinus speaks of "2,/cipoi, TaXdrcKov edvo?. 

Procopius joins the S/ctpot with the Goths and Alans. 

Jornandes mentions the Sciri as either subjects or allies 
of Odoacer. 

If we take these statements without criticism, we find 
difficulties that even the assumption of migrations will not 
account for ; since, although a movement from the Baltic 
to the Danube, between the time of Pliny and Procopius, 
will account for their presence on that river, it is of no avail 
for the Sciri of the Olbian Inscription — which is generally 
referred to a period anterior to the time of Pliny, i.e., the 
first or second century b.c. 

Sidonius makes the Sciri part of Attila's army. 

Jornandes connects them with the Alans — "Sciri et Sa- 
tagarii et ceteri Alanorum, cum duce suo, nomine Candax, 
Scythiam minorem, inferioremque Moesiam accepere. - " — De 
Reb. Get. 49, 50. 

The evidence of Jornandes is important, since Peria, the 
notary of Candax, was his grandfather. 

Now, as we are much surer of the Sciri of Jornandes on 
the Danube, than of those of Pliny, their ethnology will be 
considered first. 

a. They were either Germans, or under German leaders : 

u 



XCVlll THE GERMANY OF TACITUS 

since we have the names of two of their leaders, Edica and 
Wulf, both of which are German. 

b. There were Sciri as far east as Bavaria ; since a Ba- 
varian legend mentions Eticlio and Welf in connection with 
the Scherezene Wald=nemus Scirorum = ihe present Scliar- 
nitz (a Slavonic name) on the Iser. 

c. The name can be connected with Steyer-mark = Styria 
= the March of the Styri ( = Sciri). Not only is the change 
from sc- to st- (and vice versa) common (especially in Slavonic 
names, of which it is, perhaps, prima facie evidence), but a 
Bavarian count called Wernher von Schiern in one place, is 
called Comes de Stira in Bavaria, in Godfrey of Viterbo, ad 
an. 955. Add to this, that, amongst the names of the Counts 
of Steyerm&vk Ottachar (Odoacer) is a common one. 

All this, is from the D. S. i. 464—468. 

But the Sciri and Turcilingi were closely united — po- 
litically at least ; and, as already stated, the Turc-i\mgi 
have the root Turk, as part of their evidently derivative 
name. 

And the Sciri have been already called an Alan population 
— the Alans being, almost certainly, Turk. 

Add to this that the Sciri were in alliance with the Turk 
Buns — 'O he OvXht? (6 r}ryov[xevo$ twv Oi/j^vcoj') irpos rb 
Trepav tou TTorapLov p,6\c<; Sceacodr], 7ro\\ov<5 diroSaXcav, 
dphr/v he rovs KaXov/xevow; ^Ktpov^. "E0vos he tovto /3dp- 
£apov, ifcavoos iro\vdv6pw7rov, irplv roiahe irepinrecrelv 
crvfjbcpopa. 'Tcrreprj(javTe<i <yap ev rfj <f)v<yf}, ol fiev avTtov 
dvypedrjaav, oi he ^wyprflevTes, hecrfiioi, 7rpo<? rrjv Kcovravrt- 
vovTTo\iv i^e7rep,(f)67]aav. Ao^av he tois apyovcnv hiavelfiat 
tovtovs, fir} rt Trkrjdo? ovres veoorepLacocn' tou? /Jbev eV 
0X17049 ripb^pbaai direhovro, tov$ he iroXkol^ 7rpoifca hov- 
Xevetv irapehoaav, eirl rb fjbTjre Ka>v<TTavTtvov7rokeoy<;, /jbrfre 
wdcrr}^ Eup&J7r?79 eirt^aiveiv, koX rfj fJieay QaXdcrcrr) ywpi^eadav 
rbv iyvcocrfMevov avrots toitov e/c tovtcov re 7r~kr}6o<> dirparov 
irepCkeifyOev a\\o<; dWa^f) hiarplSetv ird^Orjaav- Uo\- 
\ov<; he eirl rrjs BiOvvla 1 ? redea/xat 7rpb<; t&> KaXovfievoy 
'OXu/i7Tft) bpeu, (jTTopdhiqv oitcovvras, ical tovs avroOi \6(pov$ 
Kal V7rwpeia<i <yewp<yovvTa<;. — Sozom. ix. 5. 



EPILEGOMENA. XC1X 

And, also, that a chief with the Turk name Aspar* (perhaps 
a Turcilingian) took part in their politics : — -On 2/a'pot koi 
YotOol ei? iroXe/Jbov avve\66vT£<i /cat 8ta%copicr6ei>Te<; afi- 
(porepoi 7rpo<i a-Vfifid^oyv {AerdfckTjcrLV irapeafcevd^ovTO' iv 
of? Kal irapd rovq ia>ov<; tjXOov. Kal \a-irap puev rjyeiTO 
/ucrjSerepoi'i avp^fia^elv, 6 8e avro/cpdrcop Aecov iSovXero 
S/apot? iiracovpelv. Kal 8rj ypd/xpiora 77730? rbv iv 'IWvpiol*? 
(rrpaTrjyov eTrefJurev, ivreWo/jbevos acpocriv Kara r(bv TotOcov 
fiorjOeiav ttjv irpoarjKovaav irepbireiv. — Prisci Rhet. Fragm. 
ed. Bonn. p. 160. 

It is, then, not wholly improbable that the Sciri and 
Turcilingi may have been Turks; the first, perhaps, of that 
stock that penetrated far into Europe. The Sciri, after their 
misfortunes having been reduced in power, became subject to 
Gothic leaders, and, finally fixed, as a military colony, in 
Styria (Steyer-mark, or the March of the Styri) . 

The notion that Hirri = Sciri is confirmed by the form 
Sfclppoi in Procopius, Bell. Goth. i. 1 : — IZtcLppovs Kal A\d- 
vovs Kal aWa drra Yordifca iOvrj. 

But how are we to account for the Sciri of Pliny, placed 
by that writer so far north as Eningia, probably Fenningia = 
the Finn country \ We may suppose him to have lain under 
the same mistake with Tacitus in respect to the distance between 
the parts about the Gulf of Riga and the Lower Danube, and 
to have made it less than it really was. Hence, as Tacitus 
(Germ. § xlvi.) brings the Peucini and Bastarnee too near the 
Finni and Venedi, Pliny does the same with the Sciri. 

It may be added that, amongst the members of the Hun 
confederacy, no element, in words apparently compound, is 
more common than the combination of r and a compound 
sibilant (sh, zh, tsh, dzh) ; and (as a consequence of this) no 
termination is more common amongst Hun nations than that 
of -zuri, -sciri, &c. 

That this compound sibilant is just the combination which 
is rendered sometimes by sk, and sometimes by st, as is 
suggested in not. ad v. Narisci. 

Thus, amongst the names which no writer has ever made 



* This is also an ham 



tan name. 



C THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

German, and but few have considered Slavonic, we have in 
the different Hun, Alan, Avar, and Bulgarian alliances the 
following — 

1. Alpil-jswW, al. AfitX-tyvpou, &c. 

2. AXcx-dzwi, al. XJlcini-Zures, OvXrl-^ovpot, &c. 

3. Angi-sciri. 

4. A/CaT-^LpOL. 

If we add to these the word ending in -(jurii, the number 
is increased — Sata-^tom, Ono-purii, &c. 



$> XXXVI. THE ALANI. 

It has been stated that the Alans were of the Turk stock ; 
and as the Sciri have been placed in the same category with 
them, the Sciri being a people that has sometimes been con- 
sidered German, the investigation of their ethnology finds 
place in the present work. 

The two broad facts that bear upon this question are — 

1. The area of the Alans is beyond that of either the 
Germans or the Sarmatians. This was the parts due north 
of Circassia, or the great irregular triangle formed by the 
Lower Don, the Lower Volga, and Caucasus. 

2. The present occupants of this area are the Nogay 
Tartars of the Turk stock — occupants who cannot be shown 
to be of recent introduction. 

3. Lucian (Toxaris, 51) makes them Scythians — Tavra Se 
e\eyev 6 Ma/cevrT]*?, o/Aoer/ceuo? koX ofioykcorros to?9 AXavois 
&v Koiva jap ravra AXavois /cal ^Kv6ai<i, rrXrjV on ol rrdvv 
KOfjbwcnv ol AXavoX oycnrep ol ~2,/cv6at. AXXa 6 Ma/civr?]? /cal 
ravra ecKacrro avrols real cnreKeKapicei tj}? ko/jLT)?, ottoctov 
et/co9 rjv eXarrov KOfxav rov AXavbv rod 1,kv0ov. 

This reduces the stocks that may fairly claim them to three. 

1. They may have been the most northern branch of the 
Circassians. 

2. The most southern of the Ugrians. 

3. Turks. 

The Turk character of the present population favours the 
third of these stocks. 



EPILEGOMENA. CI 

So does the part the Alans played in history — greater than 
that of the Circassians, and the same in kind with that of the 
Turks. Besides which, no Circassian nation was likely to be 
called Scythian. 

Minute . ethnology gives us more facts in support of this 
affinity. 

The Alans were what the Huns were — " Proceri autem 
Alani psene sunt omnes et pulchri, crinibus mediocriter flavis : 
oculorum temperata torvitate terribiles et armorum levitate 
veloces, Hunnisque per omnia suppares, verum victu mitiores 
et cultm" — Ammianus, xxxi. 2. 

This carries on the investigation to the consideration of 
the Huns. 

§ XXXVII. THE HUNS. 

The expressed opinion of Niebuhr is that the Huns were 
Mongols. This being the inference from the descriptions of 
their personal appearance alone, combined with the inaccu- 
rate notion that it is only in the true Mongols of Mongolia 
that the physiognomy of the Huns of Attila is to be found.* 

Humboldt has expressed himself with equal confidence as 
to their being Ugrian, and this is, perhaps, the current no- 
tion. It chiefly rests upon the present occupants of Hun-garj 
belonging to that stock. 

Zeuss, however, whose account of all such nations as no 
migrations and no etymologies can convert into German, is as 
unexceptionable as it is valuable, makes them Turks, and so, 
perhaps, do the majority of writers who have gone beyond 
their first impressions, and undertaken the investigation of a 
somewhat complex question. 

The first step towards ensuring ourselves against being 
misled by the similarity of names Hun and Hun-gsny is to 
remember that the names Welshman and Greek are not more 
foreign to the Cambro-Briton and the Hellene than is the 
name Hun-garian to the Majiar. The Slavonians of Mo- 
ravia, Bohemia, Poland, Gallicia, Servia, Russia, and Croa- 

* The extent to which the so-called Mongol physiognomy is common to 
the proper Mongolians, the Turks as well, is considered in the author's 
Varieties of the Human Species, pp. 77 — 79. 



Cll THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

tia call him so, and we of England use the name thus applied. 
But that is all. 

In his own eyes he is a Majiar ; Mogerius as the few old 
Latin writers who adhere to the native appellation have it — 
Mogerius, or sometimes Dentu-Moger'ms. 

Yet, with all this, he is not a Hungarian exactly, as the 
Spaniard of the New World is a Mexican; and the reason why 
the Slavonians call him Hungarian is not because he settled 
in a country to which the name of Hungary had been pre- 
viously given by the Huns of Attila. The proofs of this 
name being in use between the fifth and ninth centuries, are 
few and far between ; nor yet are they absolutely conclusive. 

The real reason why the Majiar bears in countries around 
him the same name with the subjects of the Scourge of God 
lies deeper. Just as the Germanic nations call not only the 
Cambro-Britons by the name Welsh, but the Italians also, 
the Russians of Eastern Europe called their most western 
Asiatic neighbours by the general name of Ungri — whether 
Turk or Finn : so that whether the one or whether the 
other wrested from Europe a part of the soil, the territory 
thus appropriated would equally be called Hungary. 

This we learn from Nestor, who separates the Ugrian Ma- 
jiars from the Turk Chazars, by calling the one Black the 
other White * Huns. 

From the name Hun not being native, the investigation 
of the ethnological affinities of that nation becomes difficult ; 
and this difficulty is increased by its being applied to two 
different classes of western Asiatics. It unfortunately 
happens, too, that whilst the rulers of the Avars, the Chazars, 
the Petchinegi and other tribes are frequently mentioned by 
the truly Turk term Khan (Xdyavos), that title is never 
given to Attila — who is either rex or /3acn\eu<i. On the other 
hand, however, Paulus Diaconus writes — " Huni qui et Avares 
dicuntur ;" and Priscus speaks of the ChasarHuns ('A/mripoi? 
Ovvvois), the Tartar affinities of the Chazars being beyond 
doubt, and the king of the Avars being often called Khan 
(Xd<yavo<i). 

* The forms of this word are, in the Old Slavonic Ugri, in Bohemian 
TJhry, in Polish Wggri, in Russian Vengri. 



EPILEGOMENA. Clll 

This is evidence of a more indirect kind than we expect in 
a nation like the Huns, but, provided that we clear our minds 
of all prepossessions arising from the name, it is, perhaps, 
sufficient. 



§ XXXVIH. THE SZEKLERS, SICULI, OR SYSSELE (?). 

The note of interrogation denotes that the identity of these 
three populations is open to the further investigation of 
scholars, and that the present writer hesitates about it. 

Alfred mentions the Syssele — " Be norSan Eald-Seaxum is 
Apdrede, and east norS Vylte, be man iEfeldan haet, and 
be eastan him is Vineda land, be man hset Syssyle, and east 
su3 ofer summe dsel Maroaro. 1 ' 

At the present moment a part of the Hungarians is called 
Szekler, pronounced Sehler. Now in the work known as 
that of the Notary of King Bela we have the following 
passage: — " SicuM, qui primo erant populi Attilce regis. ,, — 
Not. c. 50. And also " Tria millia virorum, eadem de natione 
(Hunorum). . . metuentes ad Erdewelwe confinia videlicet 
Pannonicse regionis se transtulere, et non Hunos sive Hun- 
garos, sed ne illorum agnoscerentur esse residui, Siculos, 
ipsorum autem vocabulo Zekel, se denominasse perhibentur. 
Hi Siculi Hunorum prima fronte in Pannoniam intrantium 
etiam hac nostra tempestate residui esse dubitantur per 
neminem, cum in ipsorum generatione, extraneo nondum per- 
mixta sanguine, et in moribus severiores et in divisione agri 
ceteris Hungaris multum differre videa!!^!'." — Thwrocz, ap. 
Schwandtn. p. 78. 

In Majiar, in the same page of Zeuss, I find that Szekely 
(in the plural Szekelyek)=Marchman. 

Between the — 

a. Late date of the authors, and — 

b. The likelihood of the Majiars having taken the word 
Zihel from the Siculi, the following inference is exceptionable. 

But it is — 

That, even before the time of Alfred, Ugrians, of the same 
branch with the Majiars had found their way to the Danubian 
provinces — probably as part of the Hun forces, 



CIV THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

The objection, notified in not. ad v. Sarmatis (p. 16), against 
the power of the word JasyJc, finds its place here. In Majiar 
Jasag = bowman. Now if we carry the existence of Majiars 
in Europe as far beyond the date of the Siculi (supposing 
them to be what is here suggested) as the Siculi are earlier 
than the undoubted Majiars, the name of the Jazyges may 
be not Slavonic but Majiar. 

This would, certainly, throw a doubt over many important 
deductions. But, as the Majiars may have taken the name 
from the Jazyges, and having first called them bowmen, called 
others so also, I do not lay much stress on the fact. Besides 
which the word Jazyh would not cease to be Slavonic simply 
because it was Majiar also. 



§ XXXIX. THE HUGH, heruli, turcilingi and sciri. 

If we look back on the evidence of these tribes being 
Germanic, we shall find what we found with the Gepidaj — 
the evidence of their locality and the testimony of certain 
authors against them, that of their alliances and the names 
of their leaders in favour of them. 

The Rugii have the best claim. They have a name in 
common with the Rugii of Tacitus ; but this, even if liable to 
no exceptions, would only imply a migration — not, neces- 
sarily, a Germanic one. On the other hand, they are identi- 
fied with the Turcilingi, whose claim to be considered Ger- 
mans is the worst. 

The Heruli have their relations to the Aviones ; but this 
only implies that the Aviones moved southwards. 

Upon the whole, I think that none were German — but am 
unable to distribute them among the Turk, Slavonic and 
(even) Ugrian stocks. 

The populations which now follow, have their relations with 
English rather than Roman history. 



§ 



XL. THE VARNI. 



This is a difficult name, and I limit myself to the establish- 
ment of one proposition — viz. : that it is not necessary to 



EPILEGOMENA. CV 

deduce the Vami of the fourth, fifth, and sixth centuries, from 
the Varini of Tacitus ; i.e., that no migration from north to 
south, between the time of Domitian (when Tacitus wrote) and 
Augustulus is required. 

The phenomena may he accounted for otherwise. 

The locality of these latter Vami is the Middle Danube. 
Their theatre is Italy, the Rhine, and Spain. The names of 
some of their leaders are German — e.g., Achi-ulf: — "Theo- 
dericus prseponens Suevis, quos subjecerat, clientem Achiulfum. 
Qui in brevi animum ad praevaricationem ex Suevorum suasi- 
onibus commutans neglexit imperata complere, potius tyrannica 
elatione superbiens, credensque se ea virtute provinciam obti- 
nere, qua dudum cum domino suo earn subjecisset. Is siqui- 
dem erat Warnorum stirpe genitus, longe a Gothici sanguinis 
nobilitate sejunctus, idcirco nee libertati studens, nee patrono 
fidem servans." — Jorn. c. 44. 

In Italy we have the notice of Agathias : — Napo-fjs e? 
'ApLfATjvov e-%d>pei ttjv iroXiv, £vv rots oiroaoi aura) zeal 
Trporepov eirrovTO. 'E7retoV/ <yap Ovd/c/capo? 6 Ovapvos to 
<yej/o<? 6\L<y(t> irpoTepov ireOvrjKet, avrjp iv tols /idXccrra 8eivo<; 
re teal (j)L\o7r6\epo<;, avrifca 6 7rai<; 6 licelvov 0euo7£a\So? 
(tovto jap ovojjua tw TratSl) afia rots i7rop,6voL<; Ovdpvois 
fiaaiXei tmv 'Pco/xaioov irpoae^fjopeL xal e? Apl/xyvov iraprjv, 
a>? avrov T<x> Napcry ivrev^opevos. — i. 24. 

Now these Vami need, by no means, be the Varini of 
Tacitus ; since Ptolemy mentions Avareni on the Vistula ; 
so that they may as easily be the one as the other : — 
Avaprjvol nrapd ttjv K6(paXi]v tov Oviarovka Trora/mov. f T(/>' 
01)9, "Op&pwves. Etra, AvaprocppdiCTOL. Elra, Bovpylcove^. 
Elra, Apcnrjrai. Elra, 2a§o/cot. Elra, Tlievytrai, ko\ Btecr- 
aoL irapd rov KapTraTTjv 6po<?. Another reading is A§aptvoi^ 
a migration which would bring these Avapr/vot from the 
Varini must have been immediately subsequent to the time 
of Tacitus. 

I believe, then, the Vami of the Danube to have been Ava- 
reni ; and of the Avareni being new immigrants, there is no 
proof, and a presumption against it. 

At any rate, the probability of a migration is decreased by 
the decrease of the time allowed for it. 



CV1 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

The best evidence of their being Germans is that of the 
names of their leaders ; but such evidence would make the 
Spaniards who fought under Wellington, Englishmen. 

But what if we find Varni on the Rhine, a comparatively 
northern locality \ The most that follows from this is a 
doubt as to which of the two nearly synonymous populations 
they were — Avareni of the Vistula, or Varini of the Lower 
Elbe. 

What if we find them in connection with the Angli f This 
helps us in the decision, and inclines us to prefer the Varini ; 
but it by no means proves connection. 

But what if they be Angles in Thuringia ? This, again, 
only makes us pause in deciding which Angles are meant. 
It never touches the connection. 

What if we find them in contact with the Danes I This 
denotes that the particular V-r-n- thus described were Varini. 

But what if Dani=Daci?* This throws us back on the 
Avareni. 

Nothing, however, touches the connection. It is only the 
details that are complicated : details which are just as diffi- 
cult, whether we suppose a migration or not. 

All this really happens, as may be seen by comparing the 
following extract with the Epilegomena, §§ xli. and xlii. : — 
Ovapvot /jbev virep "larpov iroTa^bv tSpwrat, Sttf/covcri Be 
ayjpi re 65 'Qiceavbv tov dpicTwov ical irorafibv 'Prjvov, ocnrep 
avTOvs re Btopt^et zeal <$>pd<y<yov<; /cal raXka e0vr), a ravrr] 
iSpvvrai. Ovtol airavres, baot to TiraXatbv aptyl 'Prjvov 
eKarepcoOev Trorafibv o)KT]vto, IBlov /xev twos 6v6/xaTOs eicao-Tot 
fj,€Te\.dy%avov . . . eVl Kotvrjs Be Tep/xavol i/caXovvTo diravTes 
. . Ovapvot Be /cal <$>pd<yyot tovtl fxovov tov 'Vrjvov to vBcop 
fi€Ta%v exovenv. — Procop. Bell. Goth. iv. 20. 

Again, "Epov\ot . . eprjfzov Be x < ^ i P av BtaSdvTes ivOevBe 
TroXKrjV e? tovs Ovdpvovs KaXov/xevovs excoprjerav. Me#' ovs 
Br] /cal Aavwv to. edvq irapeBpajjuov. — Procop. Bell. Goth. ii. 15. 

Lastly, Procopius relates that an Angle princess was be- 
trothed to Radiger, the prince of the Varni. — The Saxons 
in England, i. 23. 

* See Epilegomena, § Dani. 



EP1LEG0MENA. 



§ XLI. ON THE ANGLI OF THURINGIA. 

The heading of a body of laws of, perhaps, the tenth 
century, is, Incipit Lex Anglorum et Werinorum, hoc est Thu- 



Zeuss mentions Englide or Engilin as a Thuringian Gau= 
pagus. 

§ XLII. ON THE WERINI OP THURINGIA. 

This must be read along with §§ xl. and xli. 
The Werra was a river of Thuringia, which it divided from 
Saxony. 

a. Unless we suppose either that the river Warnow effected 
a migration — 

b. Or that it took its name from the Varini, who did so — 

c. Or that there was a colonial settlement — ■ 

We must suppose that the population took its name from the 
river, that Werini meant the people of the Werra, and that 
the two populations were as unconnected as the two rivers. 

But the names of different rivers being so like, as Werra is 
to Warnow, is against the chances. 

And the two Angle localities are so as well. 

And the contiguity of the Angles of the Elbe to the Varini, 
taken with that of the Angles of Thuringia to the Werini, 
is still more so. 

Still the names of the rivers are facts which we must take 
as we find ; since the circumstance of a river taking its name 
from its occupants is as rare as the converse is common, 
especially amongst the Slavonic populations. 

Even if we assume a colonization like that of the Ghamavi 
and Ghattuarii, the difficulty is only diminished ; since it 
would still be strange that the people of the War-noio should 
be removed to a locality with a name so near their own as 
the Werra. 

Werra may possibly, like Oose and Avon, have been a 
name that, from being a common rather than a proper one, 
recurs in different places. 

Still, the difficulty of the relation of the Angli and Werini 



CV111 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

of Thuringia on one side, and that of the Angli and Varini 
of Mecklenburg on the other, remains. 

I am inclined to believe in a colonization ; at any rate, I 
am disinclined to lay so much stress on the heading- in 
question, as to allow it to disturb — as I once* did — the 
general and admitted ethnological differences between the 
Saxon Angles and the High-German Thuringians. 

Still, to explain the similarity of name, conjoined with the 
geographical contact of the Angles, by the assumption of a 
colony, by no means explains the nearly contemporaneous 
existence of Varini and Varni. 

The doctrine of the rivers, however, does ; the reasoning- 
running thus— 

There was more than one Slavonic river W-r ; and — 

More than one Slavonic population that took its name from 
such rivers. 

Still, this is but hypothesis. 

§ XLIII. THE YMBRE. 

This name occurs in the Traveller's Song. 
It has been supposed to mean the people of the isle Am- 
rum of Sleswick. 

Also, the Ambrones of the Cimbro-Teutonic invasion. 
I think it means one of three things. 

1. Humbrians, or people of the Ymbra-land, a name not 
improbably applied to the East Riding of Yorkshire and North 
Lincolnshire, although at present we have only the compound 
T$OYth.-humber-\a.nd (North-V^w^ra-land) in an undoubted and 
unexceptionable form. On the other hand, the British king, 
Uther Pendragon, is made to say, " Vocabant me semimor- 
tuum Ambrones isti, sed malo semimortuus eos superasse 
quam incolumis superari." — Sigebert, Gemblacensis, ad an. 
4?66. Nennius places the Ambrones near the Picts. 

2. Certain Old Saxons : — " Paulinus Eboracensis Archiepi- 
scopus eos baptizavit et per xl. dies non cessavit baptizare 
omne genus Ambronum, id est, ^^saxonum. 1 ' — Nennius, ap. 
Gale,i. 119. 

* In my work on the English Language. 



EPILEGOMENA. C1X 

8. The occupants of the district of Amer-land in Olden- 
burg. 

It is not impossible that the first two Ambrones may be the 
same people, i.e., both Saxons of Britain, rather than British 
Saxons, in the first case, and German Saxons (as the true Old 
Saxons were) in the second ; since there is some difficulty in 
believing an archbishop of York to have been employed so 
far from his diocese as Westphalia, and a Welsh monk 
recording his operations. — Since 

a. There may have been certain Old Saxons in Britain ; 
just as there were certain Frisians. 

b. Old Saxon might, to a Briton like Nennius, have been 
equivalent to pagan Saxon ; since one of the first duties of 
the Christianized Anglo-Saxons of England was to convert 
the Old Saxons of the Continent, as is narrated fully by Beda. 
Hence, the distinction between Pagan and Christian nearly 
coincided with that between English and Westphalian — insular 
and continental — Old and Angle. 

A reason for the Britons being ready to apply such a 
name as Ambrones to their invaders, is well supplied by 
Zeuss (p. 151). Some of the Keltic neighbours of the 
Ambrones, conquered by Marius, called robbers Ambrones — 
" Ambrones prsedationibus se suosque alere cceperunt . . ex 
quo tractum est, ut turpis vita: homines Ambrones dicerentur." 
— Festus. 

The Ligurians called themselves so — StjfxS? <yap avrovs 
ovtco<? ovo/xd^ovcn Kara yevos Alyves. — Plut. vit. Mar. 

This makes it look as if the Ligurian Ambrones were such 
formidable robbers as to have made their name synonymous 
with plunderer — for, it must be observed that Plutarch says 
that they called themselves what Festus says their neighbours 
called them, men of a bad life. 

The word Ymbre has thus been enlarged upon, because it 
has been put forth as an element in the doctrine of the 
German origin of the Cimbri and Teutones ; to which has 
been appended the more especial doctrine that these Ligurian 
Ambrones were part and parcel of the so-called Germans of 
the Pennine Alps. — See § i. note 3. 

What the Ymbre were is uncertain. The Ambrones were 



CX THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

simply Ligurians; and, as such, probably Keltic. This, 
however, is no part of German ethnology. 

What follows is a mere suggestion. It has arisen from 
the extent to which the pluri-presence of populations with 
names in -mbr- would be explained by the hypothesis that 
that combination was, like the word Marcomanni, expressive 
of some physical or political relation : in which case there 
might be as many nations named Ambr-ox\Q$, Umbr-i, Cumbr-i, 
Gambr-ivii, Si-cambr-'i, &c, as there were instances of such a 
relationship occurring. In this case, of course, all the names 
must be referable to one language. This is no difficulty. 
Such a language is the Keltic. 

Now all the nations thus named occupy the lower part of 
some river, i.e., its Humber. 

1. The Ambrones seem to have been on the Lower Rhone. 

2. The Umbri on the Lower Po. 

o. The Cumbrians of Cumberland on the Sol way. 

4. The Gambrivii and /Si-cambri * on the Lower Rhine. 

Assume, then, Humber to be the Gallic and East-British 
form of the Welsh Aber, and the Gaelic Inver==mouth of a 
river, and all these facts are connected. 

Still, the doctrine is but a suggestion, and its application 
to the details of the Cimbri and Kymry has yet to be 
made. 

One fact, however, deserves notice. Both the Cimbri and 
Ambrones are said to have been driven from their own 
country by inundations. 

Of the Ambrones Festus {loco citato) writes — " Ambrones 
fuerunt quEedam gens Gallica qui, subita inundatione maris, 
cum amisissent sedes suas rapinis et prsedationibus se suosque 
alere cceperunt." 



§ XLIV. THE TEUTONES AND TEUTONAEII. 

Mela places Teutoni on the Baltic. So does Pliny. It 

was Teutones to whom the amber-gatherers sold their amber. 

It has been supposed, however, that the text would be 

improved by reading Guttones — unnecessarily. Ptolemy 

* Qy. South-Humbrians. 



EPILEGOMENA. Cxi 

mentions both Teutones and Teuton-arii (Tewtowo-ware) with 
the Viruni between the Saxons and Suevi. 

This places them in the parts about the Elbe. 

Ptolemy's names, I imagine, are, like the Chatti of Essen 
and Chatt-uarii, names of one and the same people. 

Hence, it seems safe to assert — that there were Teutons on 
the Lower Elbe, near enough to the Germans to have a Ger- 
man compound, as their name — Teuton-arii = Teutono-ioare. 

Whether they were Germans is another question. They 
may have been Germans of the Germano-Slavonic March in 
Luneburg, or Mecklenburg. 

In the history of ethnological opinion these Teutones have a 
prominent place. They cannot but have been identified with 
the Teutones of the Cimbro-Teutonic war — with migrations 
to match. 

Yet the chief reason which makes the Teutones of Marius 
look like Germans is the fact that most militates against 
our identifying them with the Teutones of Ptolemy. 

Diot=people ; so that it is a common rather than a proper 
name ; and, as such, a name which may be applied to any 
population which chooses to call itself people, men, or nation. 

Now nations may do this independently of ethnological 
affinity. 

But this is overlooked ; and it is overlooked because the 
impossibility of Deut-sch = Teut-on, has never been thoroughly 
acted upon. 

The root L-t=people in German (Leute) ; yet no one 
argues that the Lat-ins, Lith-uanians, and a host of other 
populations must, for that reason, be German. 

The root V-lg=peopIe in Latin (vulg-us), yet no one gives 
this as a reason for making the Belg-a. Romans. 

F-lk, too, does the same in German. But is this a reason 
for snapping-up every nation whose name is Volc-<z, Belg-cc, 
or something like it, as German 1 If so, the Volca Tecto- 
sages would be Germans. 

Why, then, apply a rule to the root T-t=people which we 
apply to no other combination of sounds with a similar power? 
Because, the impossibility alluded to has never been truly 
realized in the mind of the inquirer, and men argue about 



CX11 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

the root of the word Deut-sch as they would not argue about 
any other root with a like meaning. 

Besides which the proof of Teut-, in Teitt- ones and Teut-on- 
arii, being German at all is deficient. It may be as little 
German as the Cant-, in Cant-ware. 



§ XLV. THE JUTES. 

That Jutes gave the name to Jut-laud is certain : but that 
they were Danes who did so, as the Angles did in the case of 
England, is doubtful. 

They more probably gave a name to an area from which 
certain subsequent Danish invaders took theirs — just as the 
Keltic people of Cantium did to Kent, the country of the 
Saxon Cantware and Kentings. 

The particular question as to whether the Jutes of Jutland 
took part in the Anglo-Saxon invasion of England, has already 
been indicated, and the question is more fully investigated in 
another work of the author's,""" the answer being in the 
negative. 

§ XLVI. THE NORDALBINGIANS. 

This is the general name for the Saxons north of the Elbe 
in the eighth century. 

An anonymous versifier (ad an. 798) writes : — 

" Saxonum populus quidam, quos claudit ab austro 
Albia sejunctim positos aquilonis ad axem. 
Hos Northalbingos patrio sermone vocamus." 

The details we get from Adam of Bremen : — " Transalbia- 
norum Saxonum tres sunt populi : primi ad Oceanum Thiat- 
marsgoi (al. Thiedmarsi), et eorum ecclesia Mildinthorp (al. 
Melindorp) ; secundi Holtzati, dicti a silvis, quas incolunt, 
eos Sturia flumen interfluit, quorum ecclesia Sconenfeld ; 
tertii, qui et nobiliores, Sturmarii dicuntur, eo quod seditioni- 
bus ilia gens frequenter agitur. Inter quos metropolis Ham- 
maburg caput extollit.' 1 — Adam Brem. Hist. Eccl. c. 61. 
" Habet utique Hammenburgensis ecclesia praescriptos terminos 
* English Language, third edition, 



EPILEGOMENA. CXlll 

suse parochise, ultimam scilicet partem Saxonise, qua? est trans 
Albiam et dicitur Nordalbingia, continens tres populos, TeiJi- 
tnarsos, Holsatos, Stormarios." — Helmold. Ohron. Slavor. i. 6. 
"Attritas sunt vires Saxonum, et servierunt Cruconi sub tributo, 
omnis terra videlicet Nordalbingorum, quae disterminatur in 
tres populos : Holzatos, Sturmarios, Thetmarclios."" — Id. i. 26. 

This means the Germans of Holstein, Stormar, and Dit- 
marsh ; but whether they were Saxons, strictly speaking, 
is uncertain. 

The present population is Platt-Deutsch ; but the intro- 
duction of this is subsequent to the ninth century. 

The population on which it encroached was North Frisian ; 
and this, I believe, to have been what was called the Nordal- 
Saxon. — See note in v. Frisii. 



§ XLVII. THE JUTHUNGI. 

I believe this to be a German modification of the Tshekh 
(Bohemian or Moravian) name of the Gothini ; the Tshekh 
modification having changed the G to J, and the German the 
t to th. Besides which, it replaced the inflectional element 
-n- by the affix -ung ; as was the case in the word Po-lab- 
ing-as = Slavonians of the Elbe (Laba) ; whereto- is Slavonic, 
Laba, Slavonic, and -ing- German. 

The form Vitungi occurs =Juthungi. Now these and 
similar varieties* should remove all difficulties on the score 
of a word taking such different shapes as Juta, Juthungi, 
Geatas, Gothi, Gothini, Gythones, Guttones, Gautee, Vitce, 
Vithungi, Geta ; since the following varieties of an equally 
simple root are as numerous. The Bulgarians appear as 
Bulg, Burg, Borg, Burug, Wurug, Wurg, Vulg; Bular, Byler, 
Bilers, Biler, Beire. Similar instances could be multiplied ; 
but this is one where the languages through which the form 
passes are the same, i.e., Slavonic, German, Latin, and 
Greek. 

These varieties of form not only cause no difficulty, 
but they supply a confirmation. The unsteadiness of power 
in the case of the consonant G, is what is expected a priori, 
* We find Vita-=Juta;. 



cxiv THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

from the sound-system of the different Slavonic languages. 
Thus, the sounds akin to the g in gun, and the k in kind, are 
not equally distributed over the Bohemian, the Polish, the 
Russian, and the Lithuanic. No Slavonic tongue has the 
four sounds of g, k, kh, and h. Each has two or three of 
them. Thus — 

Bohemian k - kh h with g wanting. 

Lwatian k - kh h ,, g wanting. 

Russian k g kh - „ h wanting. 

Polish k g kh - „ h wanting. 

Bulgarian k g kh - „ h wanting. 

Illyrian kg - - ,, Teh and h wanting. 

Lithuanic kg - - „ kh and h wanting. 

*Lettish kg - - „ k/i and A wanting. 

Hence, where the Poles say g, the Bohemians say h ; 
whereas the Russian spells such foreign words as Herold and 
Hertzog, Gerold and Gercog ; there being no sign for h. So 
that if a Bohemian and Lusatian wished to pronounce such a 
name as Got, as a Pole pronounced it, he would fail in doing 
so, and say Hot instead; and vice versa, a Lett would 
change Hot into Got. 

I admit that these facts require the initial in the words 
Juta, and Juthung, to be H rather than J.f On the other 
hand, I think that, as H is the modern form, J may have 
been the older one ; in other words, that the change from g 
to h may not have been direct and immediate, but as fol- 
lows :—g : j (y), h. 

I submit that these remarks are sufficient reasons for the 
existence of some difference at least in the forms of the names 
in question, if not for the exact differences which we actually 
find. Thus much concerning the change from g to j (y). 

The one from j to v can, in like manner, be shown to be 
no arbitrary assumption, but a true and proper letter-change 
of the Slavonic- Lithuanic languages. 



* From a valuable work on the Lithuanic language, showing its Slavonic 
character, by G. L. Daae ; Christiania. 
f Pronounced Y. 



EPILEGOMENA. CXV 



§ XLVIII. THE SAXONS. 

The hypothesis respecting the Saxons is as follows : — 

The name Saxon was to the Kelts of Britain, what Ger- 
man was to those of Gaul. 

Or, if not, what Suevi was — a name somewhat more 
specific. 

It probably applied to the Germans of the sea-coast, and 
the water-systems of the Lower Ehine, Weser, Lower Elbe, 
and Eyder; to Low Germans on the Rhine, to Frisians and 
Saxons on the Elbe, and to North Frisians on the Eyder. 

All the Angles were Saxons, but all the Saxons were not 
Angles. 

The reasoning in favour of this view is as follows : — 

That Saxon was a Britannic term is undenied. The 
Welsh and Gaels call us Saxons at the present moment. 

The Romans would take their name for certain Germans, 
as they found it with the Britons. 

The Britons and Romans using the same name, would be 
as two to one in favour of the Keltic name taking ground. 
It would be the Roman and Keltic against a German name 
single-handed. 

The only question is, whether the name Saxon was exclu- 
sively Britannic (Keltic), i.e., not German also. 

In favour of the word being German, are two facts — 

1. The thorough adoption of the root Saxon, as denoted 
not only by the use of German writers, but by its appear- 
ance in Essex, Wes-sex, Sussex, Middlesex. The reason- 
ing that applies to Suevi, applies here. 

2. The name Sax-neot, as a deity, whom the Old Saxons, 
on their conversion to Christianity, were compelled to for- 
swear. This gives us the likelihood of its being the name of 
an eponymus. I admit that this is cogent, but not that it is 
conclusive. 

3. The story about nimep eowre Saxas = take your daggers, 
and the deduction from it, that Saxons meant dagger-men, is of 
no great weight; with the present writer at least. Still, as 
far as it goes, it is something. 



/ 



CXV1 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

4. The Finlanders call the Germans Saxon. This is 
weighty. 

On the other hand — 

1. No clear distinction has ever been drawn between, e.g., 
an Angle of Suffolk and a Saxon of Ess&r. 

2. The Romans, who knew, for some parts at least, every 
inch of the land occupied by the Saxons of Germany, as long- 
as there is reason for believing that they took their names 
from German sources, never use the word Saxon at all. It is 
strange to Csesar, Strabo, Pliny, and Tacitus. (See note in 
v. Cherusci). Ptolemy is the first who uses it. 

3. A native name by which the West-Saxons of Wessex 
called themselves, was Geioissas. This is well accounted for 
by supposing it to be a British name in a German mouth. 

4. Whenever we find a population called Saxon, we find 
that, for some reason or other, it has some other name as well. 
Thus the so-called — 

a. Saxons of Holstein, are Nordalbingians when the name 
is general ; Ditmarsi, Holsati, and Stormarii when we have 
them in detail. 

h. Those of Northern Germany are West-phali, Ost-pliali, 
and Angarii. 

5. Of all such synonyms, Saxon is the least German in 
respect to its form ; a fact which precludes us from admitting 
the existence of a second language, but denying its applica- 
tion to the word Saxon. Thus, admitting that the words 
belong to different languages, it cannot be said that of the 
two — 

a. Saxon as opposed to Angle is Germanic, and Angle as 
opposed to Saxon is wow-Germanic. 

b. Nor yet can it be said of the most doubtful synonym of 
the list, Cheru-sci ; since the -sc, whether German or not, is 
more German than anything in the form Saxon. 

c. With such words as iVoroJ-albingii, West-Tph&li, and Ang- 
arii (=varii), there is no doubt. 

6. Whatever were the relations between the Angles and 
Saxons, populations differently related were called Saxons. 
Thus, the conquerors of the Slavonic . country at present 
called Saxony, the ancestors of the Saxons of Dresden and 



EPILEGOMENA. CXVll 

Leipsic, were by no means Saxons as the people of Sussex 
were. They were not even Saxons as the speakers of the 
language of the Heliand, the Old Saxons, were. They were 
either Platt-Deutsch, or High-German Germans ; most pro- 
bably a mixture of both. Yet they were called Saxons, 
because they conquered the Saxony of the nineteenth century, 
from a country which was called Saxony in the seventh and 
eighth, but which, probably, was not so called in the fourth 
and fifth, and which, certainly, was not so called in the 
second and third. 

7. Procopius mentions only three populations in Britain — 
Angles, Frisians, and Britons. 

8. The king who is said to have determined that England 
should be called the A?igle-land, was a king of the West- 
Saxons, Ecbert. 

I consider this a difficulty on one side fully equivalent to all 
on the other. It is as if the king of Prussia should propose 
that all Germany should call itself Austria. 

I think, upon the whole, that Saxon was a word like Greek, 
i.e., a term which, in the language of the Hellenes, was so very 
special, partial, and unimportant, as to have been practically 
a foreign term, or, at least, anything but a native name ; 
whilst in that of the Romans, it was one of general and 
widely-extended import. Hence, mutatis mutandis, it is the 
insignificant Saxones of the neck of the Oimbric Chersonese, 
and the three Saxon islands, first mentioned by Ptolemy, who 
are the analogues of the equally unimportant Graci of Epirus ; 
and these it was whose name eventually comprised popula- 
tions as different as the Angles, and the Saxons of Saxony, 
even as the name Gr<zcus in the mouth of a Roman comprised 
Dorians, iEolians, Macedonians, Athenians, Rhodians, &c. 

In this way the name was German, but its extended im- 
port was Keltic and Roman. With this view, there is as 
little need to consider the Saxons of the neck of the Cimbric 
Chersonese to have been exactly what the Angles were, as there 
is for considering the Gr&ci of Greece to have been exactly 
what the Athenians were. They might easily have belonged 
to another section of the Gothic population. 

Such was, probably, the case. If not, the continuity 



CXVlll THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

between the Frisians of Sleswick and the Frisians of Hanover 
is interrupted ; a fact possible enough, but still a fact requir- 
ing the assumption of movements and displacements of which 
history supplies no record. 

This will be further considered in the next section. 



§ XLIX. THE ANGLI. 

The preliminaries and complements to this § are the §§ on 
the Saxons, the Jutes, &c, the Nordalbingi, the Werini and 
Angles of Thuringia, and the notes on § xl. 

Important as are the Angles, it is not too much to say that 
they are only known through their relations to us of Engl- 
land, their descendants ; indeed, without this paramount fact, 
they would be liable to be confused with the Frisians, with 
the Old Saxons, with even the Slavonians. 

This is chiefly because there is no satisfactory trace or 
fragment of the Angles of Germany within Germany ; whilst 
the notices of the other writers of antiquity tell us as little as 
the one we find in Tacitus. 

And this notice is not only brief but complicated. 

The Eudoses, Nuithones, Aviones, Suardones, and Reu- 
digni received what little light falls upon them from the single 
circumstance of their being mentioned along with the Angli. 
They give none. 

The Varini, of whom the separate substantive and inde- 
pendent information is greater, complicate the question, by 
being a population for whom a Slavonic affinity may fairly be 



The complications engendered by the term Saxo have 
already been noticed. 

Surely, then, it is not too much to say that if it were not 
for the settlement in England, the Angli would have been as 
great a mystery to us as the Chali, the Eudoses, the Phun- 
dusii, or even the Hellusii and Oxiones. We know them from 
their relations only ; and if it were not for these, involving, as 
they do, the English and Anglo-Saxon languages and litera- 
tures, the neighbours of the Varini and Reudigni, and the 



EPILEGOMENA. cxix 

worshippers of Terra Mater, would have passed for outlying 
Frisians, outlying Chauci, or outlying Cherusci ; for anything 
rather than the representatives of a separate substantive 
branch of the great Saxon, or Frisian, or Saxo-Frisian 
division of the Germanic tongue. 

This the Angli represent ; but how far they do so single- 
handed, or how far the Eudoses and other populations of § xl. 
do the same, is uncertain. 

I think they do not do so exactly. 

1. To begin with the Varini, whose relations to the Angli, 
as already has been indicated, are eminently difficult — 

The mention of them along with the Angli, is a presump- 
tion that they were what the Angles were. 

Their common worship of the goddess Hertha is a specific 
fact ; and if it were a fact beyond doubt, there would be no 
fair reasons for refining on the natural inference from the text 
of Tacitus ; in other words, although there would still be a 
balance of conflicting difficulties, the evidence of a German 
object of worship, with a German name, in a German island, 
would outweigh the presumption arising from the Warnavi 
of authentic history being unequivocally Slavonic. 

But the fact is not beyond impeachment ; since we can find 
the elements of a natural and excusable error in the peculiar 
character of the cultus of the Angli on one side, and the 
Varini on the other. 

What if the Varini had one holy island, and the Angli 
another — so that the insula sacra, with their corresponding 
casta nemora, were two in number. I submit that a writer, 
with no better means of knowing the exact truth than Tacitus, 
might, in such a case, when he recognized the insular charac- 
ter common to the two forms of cultus, easily and pardonably, 
refer them to one and the same island : in other words, he 
might know the general fact that the Angli and Varini 
worshipped in an island, without knowing the particular fact 
of their each having a separate one. 

This is what really happened : so that the hypothesis is as 
follows : — 

a. The truly and undoubtedly Germanic Angli worshipped 
in Heligoland. 



CXX THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

b. The probably Slavonic Varini worshipped in the Isle of 
Rug-en. 

c. The holy island of Tacitus is that of the Angli — 

d. With whom the Varini are inaccurately associated — 

e. The source of the inaccuracy lying in the fact of that 
nation having a holy island, different from that of the Angles, 
but not known to be so. 

Now the passages that prove the Varini to have frequented 
the Isle of Rugen, prove something more. They prove their 
paganism. They prove, also, that some part of them were 
occupants of an island: — "Est autem insula quEedam, non 
longe a civitate ilia, habens mare inteijectum, quasi itinere 
unius diei, Verania nomine. 1 '' — " Intellexit ergo vir Dei, Vera- 
nos evangelicse gratife indignos." — " Erant autem trans 
mare barbari crudelitate et saevitia singulares, qui Verani 
dicebantur."" — Vit. Otton. Episcopi Boll. Jul., pp. 412, 413, 
444. 

Further still — and this bears on the ethnology of the 
Rugii — although it has been shown (Prolegomena, p. xix.) 
that the -g-, in the name of the Isle of Rugen, appears as early 
as the use of the word Rugiani in Helmoldus, the equivalent 
forms Rani and Runi (without the g) must be remarked. 
Now this omission of the -g- is exemplified by a vast variety 
of other forms, e.g., Ruani, Roani, Rujani, Ruia, Ruja, Roja, 
Ruiana, and others, to be found in Zeuss (p. 665). 

What is the effect of this \ It subtracts from the likelihood 
of the Rugii of Tacitus being the Rugiani of the Isle of 
Rugen, and, pro tanto, favours the inference drawn from their 
juxtaposition to the Lemovii, or the notion that they are the 
populations of the Gulf of Riga. — See nott. in vv. Rugii and 
Lemovii. 

The Varini, then, are not to be considered Angle. 

2. The Aviones, whether Obii or Chaviones (see Ejoilegomena, 
§ Obii), are a population of which we know nothing that 
helps the present question. If identical with the nation bear- 
ing a similar name, further south, they must have effected a 
migration. Upon the principle of not making this longer 
than is needful, we must place them south of the Angli, rather 
than north. Now this southern locality, thus assumed, is a 



EPILEGOMENA. CXX1 

reason against the Aviones having been Frisians, but no 
reason against their having been Old Saxons. 

But against this is Ptolemy's name Ko§avSol, and the 
Ko§avSol lie northwards. 

3. Whether the Eudoses are the same as the ^ovvhovcnot 
(see not. in § xl.) is not a matter of indifference. By identifying 
them, we ascertain the direction, if not the exact locality of 
the Eudoses. This is northwards, in the western part of the 
Cimbric Peninsula. 

4. Whether the Suardones are the same as the <$>ap6- 
Setvoc (see not. in § xl.) is still less a matter of indifference. By 
identifying them we ascertain the direction, if not the exact 
locality, of the Suardones. This is ivestwards between the 
Suebus and the Chalusus (Oder f and Trave ?). But then we 
get a complication ; since Suard- is generally considered to 
be a German root, whereas the locality is Slavonian. 

That S-rd is really a German root is rendered probable by 
the form Sweord-were in the Traveller's Song. But this only 
makes it a German gloss. That it applied to a German 
population by no means follows. No word is more German 
than Welsh, few populations less so. 

5. In the name Reudingi, the Reud- may, possibly, be the 
lire's-, in Ilre&-Got&n$. Now the Hret-Gotan were Lithu- 
anians. 

6. On the Nuithones I can throw no light at all, — not even 
in the way of guess-work and suggestion. 

If we leave Tacitus and betake ourselves to Ptolemy, we 
gain a little. In Ptolemy we not only get the names of 
certain populations, but we get their locality (or at least 
their direction) also. But they are almost all new, and other- 
wise unknown, Sigulones, Sabilingii, Chali. 

Upon the whole, I think that the Angli of Tacitus were the 
only representatives, enumerated by him, of the Anglo-Saxon 
branch of the Saxons, — unless the Nuithones be a second. 

Of the others, I think that : — 

a. Where their direction was easterly, they were Sla- 
vonians. 

b. Where it was northerly, Frisians, or Slavonians, — 
Frisians in the noxth-west, Slavonians in the north-east. 



CXX11 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

Who, however, lay to the east, and who to the north, is a 
difficult question ; and still more difficult is it to say who 
amongst the northern group, were on the east, and who on 
the west. 

The Sigulones of Ptolemy are the most decidedly north- 
western, or Frisian ; the Varini of Tacitus, the most decidedly 
eastern, or Slavonic. And this is as much as it is safe to say. 

It is more important to consider the reasons for believing 
the populations to the north-west of the Angli to have been 
Frisian, rather than Angle, Saxon, or Anglo-Saxon. Why, 
in the face of the fact of the Nordalbingians (or the popula- 
tions north of the Elbe) being called Saxons,* in the ninth 
century, suppose them to have been Frisians in the second ? 

The answer to this is sketched in the preceding §. 

If Angle populations were the earliest occupants of western 
Holstein, when and how did the Frisians displace them I 

If Frisians were the earliest, when did the Angles do so ? 

Now it must be admitted that there is some evidence in 
favour of this latter alternative; but evidence which is by no 
means conclusive. 

Alfred writes (Orosius, p. 25), respecting Other, that 
"He seglode to psein porte pe man hset HarSum. Se stent 
betwuh Winedum and Seaxum and Angle and hyrS in on 
Dene. ..and pa tvegeu dagas sev he to Hse^um come, him 
wees on pset steorbord Gotland and Sillende and iglanda fela, 
on \am landum eardodon Engle ; <zr hi Aider on land 
comonr 

He also writes, " Comon hi (i.e., the English) of prim fol- 
cum pam strangestan Germanise, 'Spet of Seaxum, and of 
Angle, and of Geatum. Of Geata fruman sindon Cantware, 
and Wihtscetan. Dset is seo peod se Wiht pset ealond on 
earda^. Of Seaxum, pset is of pam lande pe man hateS 
Eald Seaxan, comon East-seaxan, and SwS-seaxan, and West- 
seaxan. And of Engle comon Eastengle and Middelengle, and 
Myrce, and eall Norfthembra cynn. Is pset land pe Angulus 
is nemned betwyh Geatum and Seaxum. Is ssed of psere tide 
pe hi thanon gewitan oS to dsege pset hit weste wunige. 11 

And this statement re-appears in the Anglo-Saxon Chro- 
* See Epilegamena, § Nordalbingii. 



EPILEGOMENA. CXXlll 

nicle, " Da comon pa menn of prim meegSum Germanise, of 
Eald-Seaxum, of Anglum, of latum. Of latum comon Cant- 
vare, and Wihtvare (J?aet is seo mserS pe nu eardaft on Wiht), 
and paet cynn on Westsexum pe man nu gyt het lutnacynn. 
Of Eald-Seaxum comon East-Seaxan and SwS-Seaxan, and 
W0s#-/Ste<mm. Of Angle comon, se a siS^an stod vvestig betwix 
Iutum and Seaxum, East-Engle, and Middel-Angle, and 
Mearce, and ealle Nor&ymbra? 

Ethel weard also says that, " Anglia vetus sita est inter 
Saxones et Giotos, habens oppidum capitale, quod sermone 
Saxonico Sleswic nuncupatur, secundum vero Danos Haithaby." 

So does William of Malmesbury, " In oppido quod tunc 
Slaswich, nunc vero Eitheisi (al. Hurtheby) appellatur ; est 
autem regio ilia Anglia vetus dicta, unde Angli venerunt in 
Britanniam, inter Saxones et Giothos constituta." 

All these statements are referable to one of Beda's, " Ad- 
venerant autem de tribus Germaniae populis fortioribus, id est 
Saxonibus, Anglis, Jutis. De Jutarum origine sunt Cantuarii 
et Vectuarii, hoc est ea gens, quae Vectam tenet insulam, et 
ea quae usque hodie in provincia Occidentalium Saxonum 
Jutarum natio nominatur, posita contra ipsam insulam Vectam. 
De Saxonibus, id est ea regione, quae nunc antiquorum Sa- 
xonum cognominatur, venere Orientates Saxones, Meridiani 
Saxones, Occidui Saxones. Porro de Anglis, hoc est de ilia 
patria, quae Angulus dicitur et ab eo tempore usque hodie 
manere desertus inter provincias Jutarum et Saxonum per- 
hibetur, Orientates Angli, Mediterranei Angli, Mercii, tota 
Nordhumbrorum progenies, id est illarum gentium, quae ad 
boream Humbri fluminis inhabitant, ceterique Anglorum 
populi sunt orti." — Beda, Hist. Ecclesiast. i. 15. 

This shows that the English of the eighth century, at least, 
looked on Sleswick as their original country. 

To which it must be added that there is at the present 
moment a district called Anglen, a part of the duchy of Sles- 
wick, which is literally an angle ; i.e., a triangle of irregular 
shape, formed by the Schlie, the Flensborger Fiord, and a 
line drawn from Flensborg to Sleswick. Every geographical 
name in it is, however, Danish, whatever it may have been 
previously. Thus some villages end in by (Danish = town) 



CXXIV THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

as Hus-5y, Herreds-6y, Ulse-6y, Sec. ; some in gaard 
( = house), as Oegaard ; whilst the other Danish forms are 
skov = wood (shaw), hofced = head, lund = grove, &c. In short, 
it has nothing to distinguish it from the other parts of the 
peninsula. 

At one time I was inclined wholly to disconnect the name 
Anglen with the Angles ; holding that it meant the Angle (or 
nook) of land, and was, simply, a geographical term misunder- 
stood. Since then, however, I have been in the country, and 
found that there is a second Angle district to the south of 
Leek, and in the Frisian country ; a fact which invalidates 
the previous view. 

But, even if this be granted, it is only evidence to the fact 
of there being Angles in Sleswick at the time ofBeda; and 
then they are in the Slavonic part of the island, on the Baltic 
side of it, and in an area no larger than the county of Rut- 
land. 

I still think that the Angli of Tacitus were — 

1. The Angles of England — 

2. Occupants of the northern parts of Hanover — 

3. At least in the time of Tacitus — 

4. And that to the exclusion of any territory in Holstein, 
which was Frisian to the west, and Slavonic to the east. 

Still the question is one of great magnitude and numerous 
complications, involving, amongst other difficulties, the import 
of the term Saxon, and the accuracy of Beda's sources of 
information. 

That the Saxons, however, of England, came from three 
small islands, and a fraction of Holstein, and the Angles from 
a few thousand acres on the wrong side of the peninsula, is a 
doctrine beset with objections, and intrinsically improbable. 



§ L. THE DANES. 

The area of the ancestors of the present Danes of Denmark 
was only part of the present kingdom, i.e., the islands, not 
the peninsula of Jutland. 

Even for these islands Dan- formed no part of the original 



EPILEQOMENA. CXXV 

name. That was a compound of the familiar root, Vit-, viz., 
Vithes-lceth : — " Dan filius Hurnblse, de Svecia veniens, regna- 
vit super Sialandiam, Monen, Falster et Laland, cujus regnum 
dicebatur Withesleth.' 1 '' — Chron. Erici reg. ap. Langeb. i. J 50. 
" Dan pugil strenuissimus et magnis operibus prseclarus, per 
electionem totius populi constitutus et intitulatus est rex 
primo super Sialandiam, Monam, Falstriam et Lalandiam, 
cujus regnum dicebatur Vitheslceth. Deinde super alias pro- 
vincias et insulas et totum regnum." — Petr. Olai Chron. Reg. 
Dan. ap. Langeb. i. 77. " Ex ipso loco et multisaliis Cronicis 
Danorum colligitur, non esse verum, quod Jutia est Dania : 
sed, secundum Chronicas, Sialandia, Lalandia, Falstria et 
Meonia est Dania, et illas terras primo et principaliter com- 
prehends hoc nomen Dania. Dan enim, a quo regnum nomen 
habuit, multis annis dominabatur istis insulis, antequam acqui- 
sivit Jutiam. 11 — Ibid. p. 83. "Fuit in Upsala civitate Svethipe 
rex quidam Ypper nomine, tres ulios habens, quorum unus Nori, 
alter (Esten, tertius Dan dicebatur. Quem pater suus misit 
in has partes, quae nunc dicuntur Dacia, ad regendum insulas 
quatuor, scilicet Sialand, Mon, Falster et Laland, quae omnes 
uno vocahdo nuncupabantur Withesleth. Imperavit enim 
Ypper hie ab intus habitantibus, ut hanc plagam, scilicet 
Withesleth, filio suo Dan darent ad sedem regni. Quo facto 
regnavit Dan in Withesleth Sialandise tantum, civitatem con- 
struens Lethram nomine, quam magnis opibus ditavit. 11 — Ann. 
Esrom. ibid. p. 223. 

The earliest Anglo-Saxon records, speak of the Su?8- 
Dene, iVorS-Dene, East-Dene, West-Dene, and 6rar-Dene. 

The evidence, then, is in favour of the name being native ; 
but against its being of great antiquity. It was brought by 
certain Gothic Danes to a previously non-Gothic (probably 
Lithuanic) area. 

Dania., as seen in one of the previous extracts, was called 
Dacia. Did the converse ever take place \ It is generally 
assumed that it did not. Much turns on this, connected with 
the ethnology of the Heruli. Procopius (Bell. Goth. ii. 15) 
writes — ("EpouTlot) e? tou<? Ovapvovs KaXov/aivovs i^coprjaav. 
Me0' ov<? 8rj teal Aavcov rci eOvrj TrapeSpafiov . . iv6ev8e re e? 
ooKeavov a^>LKOfievoi ivavrtXkovTO. 



CXXV1 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

Jornandes, also, states that, 4i Dani, ex ipsorum (viz., Scand- 
zise cultorum) stirpe progressi, Herulos propriis sedibus expu- 
lerunt, 11 — reversing the order of the expulsion. 

Be this, however, as it may, we have the evidence of two 
writers as to the geographical and political contact between 
the Banes and Ileridi, and this, if taken without criticism, is a 
reason in favour of a long Herulian migration from north to 
south. 

But it is not conclusive. If the Dani were called Daci, 
the Daci may be called Dani, and, as it is much more certain 
that the Heruli came in contact with the Dacians of the 
Danube, than with the Danes of the Baltic, a reasonable ob- 
jection lies against the evidence of Procopius and Jornandes. 
I do not say that it is conclusive. I only show that, whenever 
we have a lengthy migration, we have the elements of a 
reasonable doubt to set against it. 

Even if we lay but little stress on this, we have the fact 
that neither Jornandes nor Procopius are satisfactory wit- 
nesses to events so distant in both place and time. 

They, probably, speculated and inferred : seeing that on 
the Danube there were two populations with names so like as 
Daci and Getce, and on the Baltic two others with names so 
like as Dani and Goihi, Geatas or Gautas. 

But how came the similar names to run in pairs 2 Danes 
alone on the Baltic, and Daci alone on the Danube, would be 
nothing very remarkable. Nor yet would Getce on the Danube, 
and Geatas on the Baltic. But Getce. side by side with Daci 
in the south, and Dani (called also Daci) side by side with 
Geatas in the north, supply a mystery. 

This is a repetition of the difficulties of §§ on the Angli 
and Werini of Thuringia, and it is a difficulty of the gravest 
character that meets us too often elsewhere. 

Accident is out of the question ; and I admit that a migra- 
tion, within a certain degree of probability, is the best solution 
of similar problems. But it must be probable ; and it must 
stand on the phenomena which it will explain almost exclu- 
sively. Such a migration receives but little confirmation from 
any so-called traditions ; because the very ease with which it 
explains the phenomena, engenders the disposition to assume 



EPILEGOMENA. CXXVll 

one. Hence I put the accounts of Jornandes low ; because 
they are just the accounts which the existing state of things 
would call for — -just as, I imagine, that the similar relations of 
the Isle of Wight population, the Angles, and the Saxons, did 
with Beda. Yet I put what may be called the pluri-presence 
of a population called D-n (or D-c), in geographical contact 
with a population called G-t, high ; and admit it to be the 
best reason existing in favour of the deduction of the Daci 
and Geta. from the Baltic. 

Yet it is not conclusive. Names may be what is con- 
veniently called correlative. Thus : — 

a. Let D-n = coastman, and G-t, a man of the interior 
country (or vice versa) ; or — 

h. Let D-n = mountaineer , and G~t = lowlander (or vice 
versa) ; or — 

c. Let D-n = native, and G-t ■= foreigner (or vice versa). 

Cases of this sort may easily be multiplied. Any one of 
them, however, shows that, wherever certain physical or 
social conditions involving the correlation in question occurs, 
corresponding names may occur also, — and that, independent 
of any descent or migration. 

I do not say that this was the case in the present instance; 
having no tittle of evidence to support its application to the 
case before us. I only say that such an hypothesis is good 
against the assumption of any equally gratuitous migration. 



§ LI. THE HARUDES. 

This is complementary to the note in v. Clierusci. 

Csesar mentions the Harudes, as forming a part of the 
army of Ariovistus ; and he is the first author who mentions 
them at all, — but says nothing about the Clierusci. 

Tacitus mentions the Clierusci, but not the Harudes. 

The Marmor Ancyranum has the form Charudes. 

The change from Ch- to H- (and vice versa) has often been 
mentioned already, — Cliatti = Hesse, Chattuarii — Hazzoarii. 

Form for form, I think Harud- is the root of the word 
Cher-usvi. 



CXXV111 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

If so, Ghev-usci is an adjective, and tlie -sc- is the -sc in 
Brittisc, the -sk- in D&n-ske, and the -ish in self-ish. 

If so, the population to whom it applied, must have called 
themselves by an adjectival appellation ; and this is no more 
than the present Danes and Swedes do, — Dan-ske, Sven-ske. 

If so, the -d- is omitted; and this is no more than what 
occurs in the form Nor-ske, from Nor-o?-ske, — the fuller form 
being Harudske, or Cherudske. 

In Beowulf and the Traveller's Song, we find mention 
of a town with a palace in it, called Heorot. 

Near this Heorot, the Heof&o-bardas were defeated ; a 
population at no great distance from the Angles — probably 
either the Bards of Bardonw'ic, or the hangobards of Tacitus. 

Except that the Hartz is a mountain-range rather than a 
town, Heorot = Hartz, of which it is the Low German form. 

I also think it was the country of the Harudes. Also, of 
the Proper Cherusci, — though, I admit, that it carries them 
as far east as it is safe to do. 

Hence, I consider that the Harudes were the Cherusci 
in the most limited sense of the term, and the Old Saxons 
the Cherusci in the widest ; the one name being that by 
which they were known to their western, the other that by 
which they were known to their eastern neighbours ; and, 
although their political extinction is doubtful, their diminished 
importance (noticed by Tacitus) may have favoured the sub- 
stitution of one name for another. 

The following lines justify us in placing the Cherusci so far 
eastward as has been done : 

Venit accola silvse 
Bructerus Hercynise, latisque paludibus exit 
Cimber et ingentes Albim liquere Cherusci. 
Accipit ille preces varias, tardeque rogatus 
Annuit et magno pacem pro munere donat. 

Claud. De iv. Cons. Honor. 450. 

The Cherusci were part of the Eastphalians (Ostphali) of 
not. in v. Angrivarii. 

But Ptolemy places the Harudes in the Cimbric Cher- 
sonese, and so (perhaps) does Beowulf. This is a grave 
objection to the previous doctrine. 



EPILEGOMENA. CXX1X 

On the other hand, the notion that the Harudes of the 
army of Ariovistus came from Jutland is beset with diffi- 
culties. 

§ LII. THE SEDUSII. 

I can only say that these are mentioned by Csesar as parts 
of the forces of Ariovistus. 

§ LIU. THE COBANDI, PHUNDUSII, SIGULONES, SABALINGII, AND 
CHALI. 

These are the tribes which Ptolemy places in the Cimbric 
Chersonese. They are now noticed in somewhat fuller detail 
than before. 

The Cobandi. — The doctrine that Ko§av$ol may have been 
sounded Covandi, and that the -d- may be non-radical, by 
which means we get at their identity with the Chavion-es = 
Avion-es is not illegitimate. Beyond this, there is no light 
thrown upon the Cobandi. See Epilegomena, §§ Angli and 
Aviones. 

The Phundusii. — The ejection of the Ph and n, brings this 
near to the name of the Eudoses in Tacitus. Beyond this, 
there is no light thrown on the Phundusii. — See Epilegomena, 
§ Angli. 

On the Sigulones, Sabalingii, and Chali, there is neither 
light nor speculation beyond what has been suggested. — See 
Epilegomena, § Angli. 

Ptolemy's details for the so-called Cimbric Chersonese, 
are fuller than those of any other writer. 

This may be a reason for their singularity. 

Another may lie in the fact of his information being re- 
ferable to a Slavonic or Keltic source rather than a German. 

§ LIV. THE PHARODINI. 

The Pharodini are placed by Ptolemy between the rivers 
Chalusus (Trave?) and Suebus {Oder?). 

Zeuss suggests that the true form of the name is 2cf>apa- 
Seivol. 



CXXX THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

In which case, he considers that Pharodini = Suardon-es 
(2cf)apo$eiv-OL, ~2(f)dpSa)v-e<;). 

If so, we have a locality for the latter. 

If not, we have two populations known by their name 
only. — See Epilegomena, § Angli, and not. in v. Suardones. 



§ LV. THE PHIR/ESI (<£>ipaiCTOl). 

These are placed by Ptolemy in Scandinavia. 
I think it is only a slightly modified form of the word 
Frisii. 

No objections lie against this from their situation being so 
far north. 

That the Frisii of Jutland are no new intruders has been 
shown. — See not. in v. Frisii. 

How far traces of them occur in the north of Jutland has 
not been shown. It was a point reserved. 

As far north as the Liimfjord, we find a Skjerr-wm-bro. 
This gives us a hypothesis for the diffusion of the Gothic 
population in Scandinavia, where these were early intruders. 

The original population of all Scandinavia was, probably, 
Finn. 

Next to these came Lithuanian G-t, who settled on the 
coast sufficiently to give their names to — 
a . Goth-land. — 

ft. B 7 *7A-esland = Sealand, Mon, Falster, and Fyen — 
y. Jut-land — their direction being westerly. 
On the principle of not multiplying causes unnecessarily, 
they are not to be carried too far inland. 

From the Frisians of Jutland came the QipcucroL of Ptole- 
my, probably, between the northern part of the Ohristiania 
Fiord and the Miosen. 

From this point the Finns were displaced by movements 
east and west ; and the Lithuanians by movements south- 
wards. 

This I infer from one of the northern districts of Sweden 
being named Suder-manma ; those parts being at one time 
the southern boundary of the conquerors from the north. The 



EPILEGOMENA. CXXX1 

most northern province of Scotland is called Suther-land, 
from the same relation to Norway. 

It was, probably, amongst the <£>ipaiaoi, of Ptolemy that 
the Norse tongue as opposed to the Frisian was developed. 

What time was required for this \ It is difficult to say. 
Not, necessarily, a very long one. 

One of the great distinctive grammatical characters of the 
Norse is the so-called passive voice. We know that this has 
been evolved nearly within the literary period of Scandinavia. 

The other is the />o^-positive article, Now this exists in 
Wallachian ; though it did not in Latin, i.e., Lat. itte homo = 
Wall, \\om-ul. The reign of Trajan, therefore, is early enough 
for the one form. Such being the case, no longer period is 
needed for the second. 

The time, however, may have been much longer — but I 
only indicate a minimum. 

Again — there may have been other Frisians than the 
Qcpatcroi of Ptolemy : but I only take what I find. 

Throughout this argument we must remember — 

That Goth, as a German name for the Swedes of Gothland, 
is a restricted and particular one — so specific as to account 
for the name Gothland only ; whereas — 

Goth, as a Lithuanic term, is wide and general, and 
accounts for the names Gothland and Jutland as well. 



§ LVI. THE DANDUTI, NERTEREANES, CURIONES, INTUERGI, 
VARGIONES, AND LANDI. 

What follows is the brief notice of some of those names in 
Strabo, Pliny, and Ptolemy, which may reasonably be applied 
to populations within the German area, but which have not 
been mentioned by other writers sufficiently to give them 
much historical or geographical prominence. They are, 
probably, the names in detail of the divisions and subdivisions 
of some higher groups already noticed.* 

1, 2. The Banditti and Nertereanes are mentioned by 

* These are the names printed in italics in the texts of Strabo, Pliny, 
and Ptolemy. 

y 2 



CXXXll THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

Ptolemy.- They seem to have been south-eastern Hessians, 
northern Franconians, or western Thuringians; or, perhaps, 
populations distributed between any two or all three of those 
divisions — Chatti, Burgundians, or Thuringians, politically ; 
High Germans, or Goths, ethnologically. 

3. The Curiones, too, seem to have been on the frontier of 
Franconia and Thuringia ; their ethnological and political 
conditions being those of the Nertereanes and Danduti, 
except that they were less Hessian. Possibly they may have 
been Slavonians, i.e., of the Upper Maine and Regnitz. 

4, 5. From Ptolemy's notice, the Intuergi and Vargiones 
were north-east of Wisbaden {Vispi) ; perhaps on the Upper 
Lahn. If so they may have been on the confines of the 
Platt-Deutsch and High German divisions — perhaps divided 
between the two. 

6. Of the Landi, mentioned by Strabo, it can only be said 
that they were Germans of the great Arminian confederacy. 



§ LVII. THE BATTI AND SUBATTII. 

Mentioned by Strabo. 

Admitting the Hessian (Chattian) origin of the Bat-avi, 
the Batti may have been the Hessians {Chatti), from whom 
it originated ; and the Su-batti {^ov-^drTioi) South-Batti, 
even as Svs-sex = South-Saxon. 

If so, the name is Low German ; and the Hessian form 
would be Bessi. 

This is verified (and the suggestion is Grimm's) by the 
following popular distich : — 

Dissen, Deute, Haldorf, Ritte, Bune, Besse, 
Das sind der Hessen dorfer alle sesse ; 

i.e., 
Dissen, Deute, Haldorf, Ritte, Bune, Besse, 
They are the Hessian thorpes, all six. 



§ LVIII. THE STTJRII, MARSACI, AND FRISIABONES. 

Names, in detail, of Frisian populations ; enumerated by 



EPILEGOMENA. CXXxiii 

Pliny. Their locality is now under water ; being, probably, 
the bottom of the Zuyder-Zee. 

1. Sturii, seems a true proper name. 

2. Marsaci, is, probably, a derivative from the root Marsh 
= Marsh-men. 

3. The Frisia-bon-es, I think, is Vriesen-veen (Frisian 
Fen), a real name in more than one Frisian locality at the 
present moment. 

As the result of a piece of guess-work, I believe that the 
-v-m, in the unsatisfactory terms Ist-se-ww-esand Ing-dd-von-es, 
is simply men =fen ; and the division is much more local 
than commentators imagine. Hence — 

1. The Herminones meant the people of the Upper Ems, 
and water-shed between that river and the Weser. 

2. The Ingsevones, the Fen-people in front of it, and — 

3. The Isteevones, the people of a Kesteven, whatever 
the import of that name may have been. 

If so, the informants of the Romans, who first circulated 
the terms, were in a predicament diiferent only in degree 
from that of a writer about England, who at Grimsby or 
Boston, had heard that the whole county was divided into 
Lindsey, Holland, and Keste-ven, and applied his information 
to the British empire at 



§ LIX. THE PARM^ECAMPI, AND ADBAB^CAMPI. 

Name, compound. 

Locality, the valleys of the Naab and Regen, 

Power of the root, c-mp, uncertain. See not. in v. 
Chamavi. 

But, in origin, probably, German. 

To what languages, the first elements (Parm- and Adrab-) 
are referable, is uncertain ; the displacements here having 
been great. 

a. It may have been some Slavonic dialect, the population 
being a western continuation of the Saxon and Bohemian 
Slaves. 

b. It may have been Boian {i.e., Gallic or Keltic). 
See nn. in vv. Boiemum and Narisci. 



CXXXiv THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 



§ LX. TERACATRIiE AND RACATJE. 

Compounds of the root rac-. 

The -t is, perhaps, a Gallic sign of the plural. — See not. in 
v. Usipii. 

To what language the root Bac- or (supposing the -at to 
be radical) Bacat is referable, is doubtful. 

It is, most likely, not German. 

Without building anything upon the conjecture, I think 
that one and the same root B-tsh, sometimes taking the 
form of B/iat-, sometimes of Bug-, sometimes of Bak-, and 
sometimes of Bacz-, lies at the bottom of the following- 
names. 

a. The province Bhat-ia, 

b. The Bug-'n of Bug-i-land, 

c. The YaK-arat, and Te-paic-ar-plai, 

d. The Baczy of Servia, at the present moment. 

§ LXI. THE CARINI. 

Mentioned by Tacitus as part of the Vindili. If so, 
Slavonic rather than German. 

§ LXII. THE VISPI. 

The names which now follow, are equivocal, i.e., although 
different from those of any populations hitherto mentioned, 
they are, still, sufficiently like to pass as repetitions of 
certain names previously considered, whilst they are suffi- 
ciently different to be reasonably considered as separate sub- 
stantive denominations. 

The Vispi are the Ovtcnrol of Ptolemy ; who places them 
as far south as the frontier of the Helvetian Desert. 

Probably, their name still exists in the Wis- of Wis-ha^en, 
in the country of the Mattiaci, as more than one commenta- 
tor reasonably suggests. If so, their locality is fixed. 

But then, their name is suspiciously like that of the 



EPILEGOMENA. CXXXV 

Usipetes, or Usipii ; a population which, unless Ptolemy 
mention it under the name Vispi, he does not mention at all. 

But Wis-baden is not too far south for the most southern 
Usip-ii. Perhaps not. We must remember, however, that 
they reach as far north as Holland, i.e., the country of the 
Tu-bantes (Twenthe). — Epilegomena, § i. 



§ I.XIII. THE Noi'C7i7r6?. 

The Nouo-t7re? (Novo-cttol) of Strabo ; known only as we 
know the Landi, i.e., as members of the great Arminian con- 
federacy, or, at least, as Germans, led in triumph for the 
victory that avenged it. 

Probably, Usipii, under another form ; especially as the 
Usipii (as such) are not mentioned by Strabo. 

§ lxiv. the XavGot, Kaov\/coi, Ka6v\/coi, Ka/jL-^navol, 

1 . Against considering the X.av§oi as the Aviones of Tacitus, 
there are no great reasons. Neither are difficulties created, 
by making it the name of a separate substantive population. 

2, 3. The other names are more problematical. 
Thus — 

Besides the KadvXicoi and Kclov\koi, Strabo mentions the 
Ghauci, distinguishing between them and the latter. Still the 
names are alike, — the more so when we find Chaucus made 
trisyllabic : — 

non indignante Chailco 

Pascat Belga pecus. — Claudian. De Laud. Stilich. 

Then there are the Chabilci of Gaul. — See not. in Germania 
omnis. 

4, 5. Kafityiavol and 'Afi-^ravol are names suspiciously 
alike. Yet they both occur in the same writer — Strabo. 

a. Are both, or either, Ampsi-mm ? 

b. Are both, or either, the people of the parts about 
Kampten in Over-ijseH 

c. Is one one, and the other the other 2 



THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 



§ lxv. the Aay/cocrapyoi. 

Such is the current reading in Strabo, who makes no men- 
tion of the hango-bardi. 

See note in v. h&ngo-bardi. 

The word is compound, and why should there not have 
been three separate substantive nations with names com- 
pounded of — 

1. The root b-rd + a, prefix. 

2. The root l-ng + an affix, — viz. : — 

1. Lang-o-bardi, or the men with either long beards or long 
halberts — 

2. Lacco-bardi, or the men with beards (or halberts) en- 
dowed with some quality expressed by l-cc — 

3. Lango-sargi, or the men whose sarks (whatever they 
were) were long f 

All such forms exist ; certainly in good authors, possibly 
in good MSS. 

Then there are, — 

4. The Ileapo-bavds of the Traveller's Song, and, — 

5. The Bards of the Slavonic Bardon-wic. 

I have no decided opinion here. It is my impression, 
however (and I imagine that the common sense view of 
the question coincides with it), that the Langobardi, Lacco- 
bardi, and Langosargi are one and the same population. 

The truth is, that geographical texts require a very peculiar 
kind of criticism. 

a. We cannot prefer one reading to another, because it will 
give us certain results ; since that (in many cases) is arguing 
in a circle, i.e., inferring the reading from the result, and the 
result from the reading. 

b. We cannot, as in other cases, argue from the context ; 
since the question is one of letters rather than of words ; 
and a proper name, in many cases, can as little be col- 
lected from the words which accompany it as the unmean- 
ing combinations which form a chorus can from the words 
of a song. 

The chief preliminaries to this criticism are clear notions 



EPILEGOMENA. CXXXvii 

as to the language of the author, the language of his infor- 
mants, and the language of the copyists of the MSS., espe- 
cially in respect to their phonetic systems. 

Now, it is not stating too much to say that all this con- 
stitutes a wholly new and undeveloped line of criticism. 

That different authors should differ in the forms they give 
the different new and strange names which they meet with in 
the geography of imperfectly known countries is natural ; but 
that one and the same author should vary is strange. Yet 
such has been the case with both Strabo and Ptolemy, and 
that to a considerable extent. 

§ lxvi. the Tejfcepot, 'lyplcoves, Kaptrvol, and Tovpcovoi. 

1, 2. How far are the first two Tencteri and Angrivarii? 
The localities are not exactly the same, nor yet the names, 
though like. 

This answer is, probably, in the affirmative. 

3. The Caritni, on the other hand, can scarcely be the 
Carini of Pliny, since the Caritni are east of the Middle 
Rhine, the Carini Vindili. 

4. The Tovpwvoi are almost certainly TVmr-ingians, of 
the Teur-io-hemum (Tevpio^aipbat) of Ptolemy. 



§ 



LXVII. ON THE RELATIONS OP THE GETM TO INDIA. 



The notice of the comparative uniformity of the Russian 
dialects, although apparently a point of Slavonic, rather than 
German, ethnology, was shown* to have an important bear- 
ing upon the text of even the Germania of Tacitus. And 
this is the case with several other questions, which, at first 
view, seem wholly remote from the subjects under present 
consideration. Nothing, however, in ethnology is isolate and 
unconnected ; and few points of the earth's surface are so 
distant as not, when certain problems are under notice, to be 
brought to bear upon each other. 

Now the case which was made out in the § on the Goths, 
* See Prolegomena, § vi. 



CXXXV111 THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

for bringing the great Lithuanian family as far south as the 
parts about Gallicia, on one side, and the Lower Danube, or 
country of the Getce, on the other, was incomplete ; since 
there was another series of facts which, difficult and mys- 
terious as they are under any point of view, are still ren- 
dered somewhat clearer by every fact which extends the 
Lithuanic area, either southioards or eastwards. 

Whatever brings Lithuania nearer to India, diminishes 
certain philological and ethnological difficulties. 

What these are, is now widely known. They are all 
referable to the single great fact of the grammatical and 
glossarial affinities of the ancient literary language of India 
and Persia (the Sanskrit and its allied forms), being with the 
Greek and Latin, with the Gothic, with the Slavonic, and, 
pre-eminently, with the Lithuanic tongues of Europe. 

No table, equally short, shows this better than the follow- 
ing one of Dr. Trithens, from the Transactions of the 
Philological Society, No. 94. 



ENGLISH. 




LITHUANIC. 


RUSSIAN. 


SANSKRIT. 


Mother . 




. mc-tina 


.. mat' 


.. matr. 












Brother . 




.. brolis 


. . brat 


... bhratr. 


Sister .... 




.. sessu 


.. sestra , 


... svasr. 


Duughter- 


in-law . 


,. — 


snokha 


... snusha.* 


Father-in- 


law 


,. — 


svekort 


.. s'vasura. 


Mother-in 


-law 


,. — 


svekrov' % . 


.. s'vas ru. 


Brother-in-law ... 


,. — 


dever' § ..., 


... devr. 


One 




.. wienas 


.. odin 


.. eka. 


Two 




. du 


.. dva 


.. dva. 






, . trys 

. keturi 


.. tri 


.. tri. 


Four .... 




.. chetuire .... 


.. chatvarah. 


Five 




. penki 


.. piat' , 


,.. pancha. 


Six 




. szessi 


.. sliest' 


.. shash. 


Seven 




. septyni 


.. sedm' 


.. saptan. 


Eight .... 




. asstu°ni .... 
. dewyni 


.. osm' 

.. deviat' , 




Nine 




... navan. 


Ten 




. dessimtis.... 


.. desiat' 


.. dasa'. 



The following similarities go the same way, viz., towards 

* Latin nurus, from snurus. f Latin socer, Greek empos. 

% Latin socrus, Greek eicvpa. § Latin levir (devir), Greek darjp. 



EPILEGOMENA. 



CXXX1X 



the proof of a remarkable affinity with certain languages of 
Europe, there being none equally strong with any existing 
and undoubted Asiatic ones. 



ENGLISH. 
I 

Thou ... 
Ye 

The*... 



LITHUANIC. 



tU . 

yus. 
tas 
szi . 



SANSKRIT. ZEND. 

aham azem. 

twain turn. 

yuyam yus. 

ta-d tad. 

sah ho. 



LITHUANIC. 

Laups-inni = I praise. 
Present. 

1. Laups -innu -innawa -inname. 

2. — -inni -innata -innata. 

3. — -inna -inna -inna. 







SANSKRIT. 








Jaj-ami = I conquer. 






Present. 




1. 


Jaj 


-ami -avah 


-amah. 


2. 


— 


-asi -athah 


-atha. 


3. 




-ati -atah 

LITHUANIC. 

Esmi = I am. 


-anti. 




1. 


Esmi eswa 


esme. 




2. 


Essi esta 


esti. 




3. 


Esti esti 


esti. 



SANSKRIT. 

Asmi = I am. 

1. Asmi swah smah. 

2. Asi sthah stha. 

3. Asti stah santi. 

In explanation of this, the voice of comparative philologists, 
ethnologists, and special scholars, is all one way. It is unani- 
mous in the decided expression of the doctrine that the 
tongues of Europe allied to the Sanskrit came from the East ; 
and I doubt whether any man living has ever recognised the 
opposite alternative, viz., that of the Sanskrit and its allied 

* Or that, this. 



CX] THE GERMANY OF TACITUS- 

languages coming from Europe. Of course, there are reasons 
for this one-sideduess, and, amongst these, the reasonable 
doctrine that the human species originated in Asia, the 
somewhat crude notion that migrations move from east to 
west, rather than from west to east, as if in obedience to some 
ethnological law, and the unwillingness to believe that the 
primary migrations by which the population of the earth's 
surface spread from some single point over the four quarters 
of the world, lie far beyond any existing means of investiga- 
tion, are the chief. 

Nevertheless, if we clear our minds of all this, the presump- 
tions arc the other way. 

When two allied populations, covering areas of different 
magnitudes, are separated from each other, and we account 
for the separation by assuming a migration, the presumption 
is that the occupants of the smaller area are derived from that 
of the larger, rather than vice versa. 

When an ethnological class falls into a certain number of 
divisions, the portion of its area, where the divisions are the 
most numerous and the most definite, must be considered as 
the oldest. 

Such are the presumptions — presumptions which we get at 
by attending to the first principles of reasoning — presumptions 
which our common-sense supplies us with. No one, I ima- 
gine, will deny their general validity, however much he may 
consider that, in certain individual cases, they give us a wrong 
result. 

Thus, taken by itself, the presumption that arises from the 
vast extent over which the English language is spoken in 
America, as compared with the limited area of the British 
Isles, is in favour of the American being the mother-tongue, 
which is known to be contrary to fact. 

But the mere question of a magnitude of area need not be 
taken by itself. It is corrected by the presumption arising 
out of the second observation. In America, the English 
language stands either alone or nearly so. In England it has 
its congeners around it, — Frisian, Dutch, Platt-Deutsch, 
High German, and Norse ; and this shows that Europe is 
the older home of the Englishman. 



EPILEGOMENA. cxli 

Such is the case where the two presumptions differ — one 
complicating the other. Yet even then the case is clear. 

When they coincide, it is clearer still. Thus, when we 
have a comparatively homogeneous language confined to the 
smaller of two areas on one side, and on the other a multipli- 
city of divisions and subdivisions spread over the larger, the 
presumption that the occupants of the former are derived from 
those of the latter, is indefinitely raised. 

To apply these rules to the present case — 

Northern India, Persia, Armenia, and a small portion of 
Caucasus, form the maximum of area that can be given to the 
so-called Indo-European languages of Asia. 

England, Germany, Holland, two thirds of Scandinavia, 
Russia, Poland, and all southern Europe, with the exception 
of Rumelia, Albania, and Biscay, form the minimum of area 
for the so-called Indo-European languages of Europe. 

Now the least that is allowed to the tongues of Europe is 
more than the most that can be given to those of Asia. The 
excess may be but small ; still, pro tanto, it shows which way 
the presumption is. 

Again — the greatest amount of division that can be got out 
of the Asiatic class of Indo-European tongues is the Ossetic, 
Armenian, and Indo-Persian tongues ; the latter meaning the 
Sanskrit and the ancient languages allied to it, with their 
real or supposed derivatives — the modern tongues of Persia 
and northern India. 

The least amount of division amongst the European tongues 
is equal to this ; for I submit that the differences between the 
Latin (with its derivatives) and the Greek, the Slavonic, the 
Lithuanic, and the several branches of the Gothic stock, are 
fully equal in value and variety to those that any principle of 
classification can get from the tongues of Indo-European Asia. 

But more must be added. Rightly or wrongly, there is an 
opinion that the modern languages of northern India are not 
Indo-European ; and — 

Rightly or wrongly, there is an opinion that the Armenian 
is not Indo-European — 

Yet no one, who admits the term at all, has ever taken 
exceptions to any of the Indo-European tongues of Europe. 



Cxlii THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

So that to derive the German, Slavonic, Lithuanic, 
Greek and Latin from India, is to derive the greater from the 
less, the multiform from the simple, the admitted from the 
doubtful. It is to deduce the stock from the offshoot, to 
move the earth with a lever in the clouds.* 

All such connections as that between the Sanskrit and 

* I must be allowed to remind the reader that from a desire to deal with 
the question as a question of logic only, and with the wish to understate, 
rather than overstate, my case, I argue entirely ex abundant!. 

Thus— 

a. I allow the Vedas to he four thousand years old — without believing 
anything of the kind. 

b. 1 allow the Hindu, Bengali, Urdu, Gujerati, Mahratta, and modern 
Persian tongues, to be as truly Sauskritic in origin as the English is Anglo- 
Saxon — without believing it. 

c. I allow the Armenian to be Indo-European. 

d. Also the Ossetic. The only facts respecting these last three points 
which I argue from, is the existence of doubts — not the validity of them. 

e. I lay no stress on the statement that the third language of the cunei- 
form inscription is other than Indo-European. 

f. I carry the traces of a Tamulian tongue, anterior to the Hindu, no 
further south than the parts about Bombay — 

g. And the traces of monosyllabic tongues, similarly anterior to the 
Sanskrit, no further south than the Lower Ganges. 

h. I allow the Siaposh to be as Sanskritic as the most extreme defenders 
of its Sanskritic origin make it, and I place the Lughmani, and other 
dialects, as well as the Pustu of Afghanistan, in the same category. 

i. I lay no stress on the Tamulian character of the Brahui, the numerals 
of which were admitted by Lassen to be those of Southern India. 

On the other hand — 

As I take exceptions to the Indo-European character of the Keltic 
tongues, and although I am, perhaps, the only philologist who does, I take 
no advantage of the current opinion, by which the contrast between the 
diiferences between the so-called Indo-European tongues of Europe and the 
comparative homogeneousness of those of Asia would be heightened. 

I wish to reduce the question to its logical form which is, that tvhere we 
have two branches of the same division of speech separated from each other, one 
of which is the larger in area and the more diversified by varieties, and the other 
smaller and comparatively homogeneous, the presumption is in favour of the 
latter being derived from the former, rather than the former from the latter. 
To deduce the Indo-Europeans of Europe from the Indo-Europeans of Asia, 
in ethnology, is like deriving the reptiles of Great Britain from those of 
Ireland in erpetology. 



EPILEGOMENA. cxliii 

Lithuanic must be explained by either a migration, or an 
original continuity of area. 

The presumptions have been determined. Let us now 
choose between these alternatives. 

The Indo-European population may have been continued 
from Asia into Europe (or vice versa) by two lines — 

1. One to the north — 

2. One to the south of the Caspian Sea. 

The difficulties, each way, are the same in amount, though 
different in kind. 

1. On the north we have the vast tracts of Independent 
Tartary, the water-systems of the Lower Jaik and Volga, 
in which the Indo-European population which, by assump- 
tion, was continuous from the Oxus to the Dnieper, has 
wholly disappeared. Now the more we go back the wider 
this interval becomes ; since, the Russians, at the beginning 
of the historical period were further from India than they are 
now. The supposed displacement, then, in this quarter must 
have been enormous. The further objections that arise out of 
the distribution of the existing Turk and Ugrian families of 
the area in question (a distribution which makes it almost 
impossible for an Indo-European population ever to have 
been on the north of the Caspian), are too numerous for a 
work like the present. 

2. A prolongation of the Indo-European area in the 
direction of Asia, and to the south of the Caspian, is, at the 
first view, practicable enough. And here the remark that 
whatever brings Lithuania nearer to India diminishes diffi- 
culties, has its bearing. Let the Getse be Lithuanians, the 
Thracians may be Lithuanic also, since more than one good 
authority of antiquity identifies the two. Then the Bithy- 
nians were Thracians — which brings the European Lithuanic 
half-way, or more, to meet the Indo-European dialects of 
Western Persia. Be it so. The Armenian language is a 
stumbling-block. It ought, from its geography, to be inter- 
mediate to the Sanskrit and Lithuanic — whereas, that it 
is Indo-European at all is more than many good judges 
allow it to be. At any rate, it is not what it ought to be 
for the hypothesis — transitional in character. 



cxliv THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

Such the difficulties attending- the doctrine of an original 
continuity of area and subsequent displacement. 

The other alternative, or that of simple migration, requires 
three facts to be borne in mind — 

a. That it is no further from the Dardanelles to the Indus 
than from the Indus to the Dardanelles. 

I. That the real conquests of Alexander (especially that 
which led to the establishment of the Greek kingdom of 
Bactria) differed from such a European conquest as is neces- 
sary to account for all the phenomena of the Sanskrit and 
allied languages in date, magnitude, and duration only — i.e., 
in degree though not in kind. 

c. That the Majiar conquest of Hungary differs only in 
date ; for, certainly, it would be a bold statement to assert 
that a similar conquest of an area of equal magnitude on the 
Indus, on the part of the Europeans of Thrace and the 
Lower Danube, at a sufficiently early date, would not account 
for all the points of likeness between the Hindu and the 
European. The likelihood of such an event happening, is 
measured by the actual conquests of the Macedonians. 

Such is the balance of the difficulties of the two hypotheses ; 
the conclusion in the mind of the present writer being' that if 
we consider the Sanskrit to be Asiatic, in the way that the 
Majiar is European, we escape the unnecessary multiplication 
of causes, and avoid assumptions of which the number and 
amount has never been fairly measured. 

How far the Jats of India are Get-<z, is a difficult question. 

The magnitude of the area in which the coincidence occurs 
is quite large enough to allow us to consider it accidental. 
Still, a case may be made out the other way. 



§ LXVIII. ON THE QUASI- GERMANIC GAULS. 

By Quasi-Germanic I mean those Gauls who, by some 
writer or other of antiquity, have been considered to either be 
German or to exhibit German characteristics. 

They are chiefly noticed in Tacitus, in § xxviii., being the 
Treviri, Nervii, Vangiones, Triboci, and 



EPILEGOMENA. cxlv 

Between these Tacitus draws the distinction (indicated in 
p. 100) by the words hand dubie ; from which I infer that, 
in the case of the first two populations, on this list, to which 
the words do not apply, there was a doubt. 

I do not, then, press the arguments against the Germanic 
character of the Vangiones, Triboci, and Nemetes — though 
some serious elements of doubts are opposed to them. Thus — 

a. The name of the 7W-boci is Keltic = the tre- in the 
Keltic names of places. But this Grimm has met by sup- 
posing it = three, so that Tri-boci = the three beeches. 

b. The names * of three out of seven of their towns are 
Keltic- — 'H Se airb rov 'OSpcyya iroTapbov 7rpo? p,e<rr]fj,@plav 
fcakelrai TepfAavia 7) avw ev 77 7roXet? dp^ofievcov airo rov 
'OSpiyya iroTajiov, 

Nep,7]TO)v puev, ~Noi6p,ayos, 
'Vovfyiava' 
Ovayyiovcov Be, Bop§r)r6p,ayo<;, 
^Apyevroparov, 
Aeyicov rj 2e§a(TT?]. 
Tpi§oKKQ)V Se, Bpevfcofiayos, 

"E\k7]§o<;.' — Ptolemy. 
Still the three German towns may have had Keltic names 
in the mouths of Keltic informants. 

However, the Keltic forms Caer, as in CW"-philIy, occur as 
well — " Tutor Trevirorum copias, i^ecenti Vangionum, Ccera- 
catium, Tribocorum delectu auctas, veterano pedite atque 
equite firmavit . . ; mox ubi duces exercitusque Romani pro- 
pinquabant, honesto transfugio rediere, secutis Tribocis, Van- 
gionibusque et Cceracatibus.'''' — Tac. Hist. iv. 70. 

The Treviri and Nervii come under a different category. 
Respecting the first the statement of Niebuhr, that their 
language was German, confidently as it is made, proves nothing. 
It assumes the point under investigation. The unlikelihood 
of the Gallic having maintained itself until the time of St. 
Jerome, is a matter for the reader to decide. The German of 
Sette and Tredice Communi {Prolegomena, § xi.) has main- 
tained itself longer. The fact of no mention being made of 

* Those ending in -mugus, 



cxlvi THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

the Galatian language, on the day of Pentecost, is a reason 
— as far as it goes. 

Another remark of NiebiuVs upon St. Jerome's statement 
is exceptionable. He considers that the supposed German of 
Phrygia was introduced by the Goths of the reign of Theo- 
dosius. Now their language would be Moeso-Gothic ; at 
least, as different from the German of the Lower Rhine, the 
only German likely to be spoken at Treves, as the present 
Dutch is from the High German of Switzerland and Bavaria. 
This difference is that of two mutually unintelligible tongues. 

The supposed descent of the Nervii from the Teutones and 
Cimbri, complicated as it is by the similar claim on the part 
of the Aduatici (see not. in v. Nervii) is available only in the 
hands of a writer who can throw any light over the deep 
gloom that invests the history of those famous warriors. 

Still, there is the evidence of Tacitus to their being less 
Gallic, and more German than the typical Gauls. 

This evidence we shall find is a reproduction of that of 
Caesar — for which see Prolegomena, p. lxxii. — where the 
two chief texts are marked in Italics, Belgas esse ortos ah 
Germanis, and Pamanos qui uno nomine Germani appellantur. 

To this — as an argument the same way — we may add the 
present existence of the Flemish language in Belgium sub- 
ject to the certainty of Flanders having been conquered by 
the Franks in the time of Clovis, and the likelihood of their 
language having been then (and no earlier) introduced. 

Such is the evidence on one side. Against it must be 
placed the general tone of Caesar's narrative, where the identi- 
fication of the Belgse with the Gauls in all essentials, stands in 
opposition to the exceptional statements as to the particular 
Germanism of the Psemani, &c. 

But this is, perhaps, neutralized by the fact of his treating 
the Aquitanians who belonged to the Iberic stock, in a similar 
manner, i.e., as Gauls. 

The presence of Belgae in Britain, is also in favour of the 
Belgse being Gauls ; since the evidence of Germans on the 
other side of the Channel, in the time of Caesar, is eminently 
imperfect, i.e., the legitimate evidence. Of course, by making 
the Belgse of the Continent German, we can bring Germans 



EPILEGOMENA. cxlvii 

into Britain. But that, again, is to assume the point instead 
of proving it. 

Some, at least, of the Belgse, were Gallic in regard to their 
constitution, — witness the Eburones, who were clientes to the 
Treviri. 

The names (e.g., those beginning in tre- and con-) were 
Gallic. This is an argument which the present writer, has, 
at the first view, no right to use ; he has so often suggested 
that a population speaking one language, might have a name 
in another. In this case, however, he may do so ; since 
Caesar was in the country of the Belgse, and, if their names 
were German, might have taken them in a German form. 
Had he never crossed the Seine, it would not have been 
illegitimate to argue, that Keltic names for Belgic localities 
and populations, were not incompatible with a Germanic 
descent for the people. 

Neither is he, perhaps, justified in laying much stress on 
the degree to which the extension of Germanic tribes to 
the Seine, would diminish the Gallic population, supposed to 
be so great ; since he has shown but few scruples in contrast- 
ing the Germanic. Still we must remember three points. 

a. First, that the recognition of the Belgse as German, 
would subtract all the country north of the Seine, from 
Gallia. 

b. That it would place Germans on the Straits of Dover, 
the most probable point for the introduction of the population 
of Britain into Kent, a country which we know was not 
German but Gallic. 

c. That, as the Aquitanians were Iberic, it would only 
leave the parts between the Seine and Loire for the Kelts. 

In the analysis of the arguments in favour of a wide 
extension of Germans into Gaul, it will generally be found — 

a. That, as a general question, too much importance is 
attached to the notion that common political relations 
denote common ethnological ones. 

b. That certain particular expressions of Osesar, showing 
that, in some of the instances before us, there were specific 
signs of Gallic origin, are omitted ; e.g., Cativolcus, a Belgian, 
says, " non facile Gallos Gallis negare potuisse." — Bell. Gall. 

z 2 



cxlviii THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 

v. 27. Also the statement, that the mode of conducting the 
attack of towns, was the same with the Belgoe and the Gauls. 
— " Gallorum eadem atque Belgarum oppuqnatio est lioec^ — 
Ibid. ii. 6. 

c. That too little stress is laid upon the undoubted Gallic 
character of the county of Kent. 

d. Too little, too, on the diminution of the Gallic area, by 
leaving it nothing but the parts between the Seine and 
Loire. 

e. Above all, too little, to a passage in Strabo, stating that 
the differences (admitted differences) between the Belgce and 
other Gauls were inconsiderable. 

/. That sufficient importance is not attributed to the fact, 
of the testimony of Caesar, not necessarily going beyond the 
assertion of a difference between the Galli and Germani, 
greater than the difference between two divisions of the same 
race . 

g. That the Belgoe may have been Germans, just as the 
Manxmen and Channel Islanders are English, i.e., only in 
regard to their politics. 

Such I believe to have been the case ; a belief which has 
suggested the term Quasi-Germanic. 

I may here remark, that the negative statement as to 
political relations being but little more that prima facie evi- 
dence of ethnological ones, is less easy of proof than it seems; 
inasmuch, as many of the instances, which the present 
writer could easily quote, would not satisfy an advocate of 
the German doctrine in its fullest extent. Many of his 
Sarmatians would be, in his eyes, Germans. Still there is 
no doubt as to such cases as the following. 

1. A Valerianus and a Martinus are mentioned as leaders 
of certain Huns. 

2. The undoubtedly Sarmatian Jazyges are allied in a 
Marcomannic war with the equally undoubtedly Germanic 
Marcomanni. 

3. The Quadi are found in alliance with both undeniable 
Sarmatians and undeniable Germans. 

In respect to the evidence of the names of the chief histori- 
cal characters of a particular population, being often as diffe- 



EPILEGOMENA. cxlix 

rent in language as that of the Duke of Wellington was from 
a Spanish private's at Salamanca, the evidence is also incon- 
clusive, and that for the same reasons. Nevertheless, an 
instance more cogent than the following can scarcely be 
imagined. 

The same writer (Tacitus) who expressly separates the 
Gothini from the Germans, and that on the strength of an 
express statement as to the Gothinian language being Gallic, 
gives us the name of a Gothinian leader, whose name is as 
unequivocally German as the eminently Germanic glosses, Boi- 
ohemum and Marcomanni. This name is C&t-walda, wherein 
the latter element is the toalda in Bvet-walda ; whatever the 
first may be ; concerning which, I think (notwithstanding 
the reasons adduced by Mr. Kemble against the Bret- in 
Bret-wa\d& = Briton), that it is the Goth-, in Goth-ini ; since 
the n- is non-radical, and reasons for the Jc = g have been 
given elsewhere. 



Cl THE GERMANY OF TACITUS. 



NOTES. 



The remarks on the extent to which a Slavonic form in 
-shtsh- might be presumed when there was a confusion 
between -sc- and -st- (see note in v. Narisci), was written 
before I found in L. G. Daae's work on the Lithuanian P'amily 
that the actual Slavonic form for the German combination 
St-, is Shtsh (s'c 1 in Bohemian, szcz in Polish, and tcha in 
Russian), and that the Polish original of Stiegletz is szczygiel. 
Such being the case, it is not too much to suggest that the 
very existence of a confusion between -st- and -sc-, is prima 
facie evidence of the true and original form being -shtsh-, and 
consequently of the word in which it occurs being Slavonic ; 
for it is onlv in Slavonic that such combinations occur. 



In p. 91 there is a material oversight. The Boii are 
placed between the Maine, Rhine, and Hercynian Forest. 
They ought to have been placed in the parts beyond the area 
thus circumscribed. I say this oversight is material ; since 
the true position of the Boii was nearer Bohemia than the 
text of note in v. Boiohemum makes it. Still, the correction 
by no means carries it as far east as Bohemia ; since the plain 
meaning of ulteriora is not any part east of the Maine, but 
the parts that immediately (there or thereabouts) succeed, or 
come next to, the Helvetian occupancy. Now, these are 
parts (and no inconsiderable parts either) of Bavaria. Bohe- 
mia, undoubtedly, comes afterwards in the same direction ; 
but so do Gallicia and many other places. The common- 
sense interpretation seems to be that where the Helvetians 
left off, the Boii began. Still, the statement in the text 
referred to is an over-statement. 



APPENDIX. 



i. 

Translation of Extract from Alfred.* 

" North of the old Saxons are the Obotrites, and north- 
east the Wylte, who are called the men of the Hevel ; and 
east of them is the Wend Land, that is called Syssele ; and 
south-east, at some distance, Moravia, and the Moravians have 
by them Thuringia and Bohemia, and part of Bavaria, and 
south of them, on the other side of the Danube, is Carinthia. 
South, as far as the mountains called Alps, and to those same 
mountains, lie the boundaries of Bavaria and Suabia, and 
east of them Carinthia. Beyond this, to the west, is Bulgaria, 
and east of that Greece, and east of Moravia is the land of 
the Vistula, and east of that Dacia, where the Goths were. 
To the north-east of Moravia are the Daleminzi, and north of 
the Daleminzi the Sorbs, and west of them the Sysele. North 
of Croatia (?) is the Land of Women, and north of the Land 
of Women is Sirmium, even to the Riphean Mountains."" 



II. 

Translation from Thorpe's Codex Exoniensis of The Scop, 
or Scald's Tale, i.e., The Traveller's Song.-f 

Widsith spake, Oft he had in hall receiv'd 

His word-hoard unlock'd, A memorable gift. 

Who a vast many [had met Him from among the Myrg- 

with] ings, 

Wonders on earth, Nobles gave birth to. 

Travell'd through many na- 10 He with Ealhild, 

tions ; Faithful peace-weaver, 



* See Prolegomena, p. xxiv. t See Epilegomena, § vii. 



clii 



APPENDIX. 



For the first time, 
Of the Hreth-king, 

Sought the home 

East of Ongle, 

Of Eormanric, 

The fierce faith-breaker; 

Began then much to speak : 

" Of many men 1 \e heard, 

20 Ruling o'er tribes ; 
(Every prince should 
Live according to usage, 
Chief after other 
Rule the country, 
He who in his throne 
Desires to prosper). 
Of these was Hwala 
A while the best, 
And Alexandreas 

30 Of all most powerful 
Of the race of men, 
And he most prosper'd 
Of those which I on earth 
Have heard of. 
JEtla rul'd the Huns, 
Eormanric the Goths, 
Becca the Banings, 
The Burgends Gifica ; 
Csesar rul'd the Greeks, 

40 And Ceelic the Fins, 
Hagena the Holmrycs, 
And Henden the Gloms ; 
Witta rul'd the Swsefs, 
Wada the Hselsings, 
Meaca the Myrgings, 
Mearchealf the Hundings ; 
Theodric rul'd the Franks, 
Thyle the Rondings, 
Breoca the Boundings, 

50 Billing the Werns ; 
Oswine rul'd the Eows, 
AndtheYtsGefwulf; 
Fin, Folcwald's son, 
The race of Fresns, 
Sigehere longest 
Rul'd the Sea-Danes. 



Hnsef the Hokings, 

Helm the Wulfings, 

Wald the Woings, 
60 Wod the Thyrings, 

Sfeferth the Sycgs, 

The Swedes Ongendtheow, 

Sceafthere the Imbers, 

Sceafa the Longbeards, 

Hun the Hsetwers, 

And Holen the Wrosns. 

Hringwald was nam'd 

The Hcrefaras' king, 

Offa rul'd Ongle, 
70 Alewih the Danes, 

Who of those men was 

Haughtiest of all. 

Yet not o'er Offa he 

Supremacy effected, 

For Offa won 

Earliest of men, 

Being a youth, 

Of kingdoms greatest. 

No one of like age with him 
80 Dominion greater 

Had in contest gain'd 

With his single sword ; 

His marches he enlarged 

Towards the Myrgings, 

By Fifel-dor. 

Continued thenceforth, 

Engles and Swsefs, 

As Offa it had won. 

Hrothulf and Hrothgar 
90 Held very long 

Peace together, 

The paternal cousins, 

After they had expell'd 

The race of Wikings, 

And Ingeld's 

Sword had bow'd, 

Slaughter'd at Heorot 

The host of Heathobeards. 

Thus I travers'd many 
100 Foreign lands, 

Over the spacious earth. 



APPENDIX. 



cliii 



Good and evil 
There I proved, 
From my offspring separated, 
From my dear kindred far, 
Follow'd widely. 
Therefore I can sing, 
And a tale relate, 
Recount before the many 
110 In the mead-hall, 

How to me the noble of race 
Were eminently kind. 
I was with the Huns, 
And with the Hreth-Goths, 
With the Swedes and with the 

Geats, 
And with the South-Danes ; 
With the Wenls I was and 

with the Wserns, 

And with the Wikings, 

With the Gefths I was and 

with the Wineds, . 

120 And with the Gefflegians ; 

With Engles I was and with 

Sweefs, 
And with the iEnens ; 
With Saxons I was and with 

Sycgs, 
And with the Sweord-Wers, 
With the Hrons I was and 

with the Danes, 
And with the Heatho-Reams, 
With the Thyrings I was, 
And with the Throwends, 
And with the Burgends ; 
130 There I a bracelet receiv'd. 
Me there Guthhere gave 
A brilliant jewel, 
For reward of song : 
That was no sluggish king. 
With the Franks I was and 

with the Frisians, 
And with the Frumtings, 
With the Rugs I was and with 

the Gloms, 
And with the Rum-Wealhs ; 



Also I was in Italy 
140 With ^Elfwine, 

Who had of all mankind, 
To my knowledge, 
The lightest hand, 
Praise to effect ; 
The amplest heart 
In the distribution of rings ; 
Of bright bracelets, 
The child of Eadwine ; 
With the Serkings I was, 
150 And with the Serings, 

With Greeks I was and with 

Fins, 
And with Caesar, 
Who o'er the joyous cities 
Dominion held, 
Wiolane and Wilna, 
And o'er the Walish realm. 
With the Scots I was and 

with the Picts, 
And with the Scride-Fins ; 
With the Lid- Wikings I was 
and with the Leons, 
160 And with the Longbeards ; 
With Hcethns and with Hse- 

leths, 
And with the Hundings ; 
With the Israelites I was, 
And with the Ex-Syrings, 
With Hebrews and with In- 
dians, 
And with the Egyptians, 
With the Medes I was and 

with the Persians, 
And with the Myrgings, 
And the Mofdings, 
170 And again with the Myrgings, 
And with the Amothings ; 
With the East-Thyrings I 

was and with the Eols, 
And with the Ists, 
And Idumings, 
And I was with Eormanric. 
All which time 



cliv 



APPENDIX. 



There to me the Gothic king 

Was bounteously kind ; 

He me a bracelet gave, 
ISO The chieftain of his citizens, 

On which six hundred were 

Of beaten gold, 

Sceats scored, 

In shillings rcckon'd 

Which I to Eadgils 

In possession gave 

My patron-lord, 

When to my home I came, 

In requital to my friend, 
190 For that he me had given land, 

My father's home, 

The Myrging's Lord ; 

And to me then Ealhild 

Another gave, 

The noble queen of chieftains, 

Eadwine's daughter : 

I her praise extended 

Over many lands, 

When I in song 
200 Had to relate 

Where I under heaven 

Knew most bountifully 

A queen with gold adorn'd 

Her grace dispense. 

When I and Skilling 

With clear voice, 

'Fore our victorious lord 

Rais'd the song, 

Loud to the harp 
210 Our lay resounded. 

Then many men, 

Haughty of soul, 

Spoke in words, 

(They who well knew) 

That they never song 

Better had heard. 

Thence I travers'd all 

The country of the Goths. 

Of course I ever sought 
220 The best,— 

Such was the household band 



Of Earmanric. 

Hethca I sought and Beadeca, 

And the Herelings ; 
Emerca I sought and Fridla, 
And the East-Goth. 

Wise and good, 
Unwcn's father ; 

Secca I sought and Becca, 
230 Seafola and Theodric, 

Hetheric and Sifeca, 

Hlithe and Incgentheow ; 

Eadwine I sought and Elsa, 

JEgclmund and Hungar, 

And the proud host 

Of the With-Myrgings ; 

Wulfhcre I sought and Wyrn- 
here : 

Full oft war ceas'd not there, 

When the Hrceds' army, 
240 With hard swords, 

About Vistula's wood, 

Had to defend 

Their ancient native seat 

Against the folks of iEtla. 

Raedhere I sought and Rond- 
here, 

Rumstan and Gislhere, 

Withergield and Freotheric. 

Wudga and Hama ; 

These were of comrades 
250 Not the worst, 

Though I them ever last 

Should name. 

Full oft from that band, 

Whining flew 

The yelling shaft 

On the fierce nation 

Where would avenge, 

The chiefs adorn'd with gold, 

Their men and women, 
260 Wudga and Hama. 

Thus I that have ever found, 

In that journeying, 

That he is ever dearest, 

To the land's dwellers, 



APPENDIX. civ 

To whom God gives Find one 

Empire o'er men Knowing in songs, 

To hold, Liberal in gifts, 

While he here lives. Who before his nobles desires 

Thus roving, 280 His grandeur to exalt, 

270 With their lays go His dignity to show, 

The gleemen of men Till that all departs, 

Over many lands, Light and life together. 

Their need express, He who works praise 

Words of thanks utter, Has, under heaven, 

Always south or north Substantial glory." 



III. 

Paper Read at the Philological Society, February, 9 th, 1844. 

On the Evidence of a Connection between the Cimbri and 
the Chersonesus Cimbrica. By Dr. R. G. Latham. 

It is considered that the evidence of any local connection 
between the Cimbri conquered by Marius, and the Cher- 
sonesus Cimbrica, is insufficient to counterbalance the natural 
improbability of a long and difficult national migration. Of 
such a connection, however, the identity of name and the con- 
current belief of respectable writers are prima, facie evidence. 
This, however, is disposed of, if such a theory as the following 
can be established, viz., that, for certain reasons, the know- 
ledge of the precise origin and locality of the nations con- 
quered by Marius was, at an early period, confused and inde- 
finite ; that new countries were made known without giving 
any further information ; that hence, the locality of the Cimbri 
was always pushed forwards beyond the limits of the geogra- 
phical areas accurately ascertained ; and finally, that thus 
their supposed locality retrograded continually northwards, 
until it fixed in the districts of Sleswick and Jutland, where 
the barrier of the sea, and the increase of geographical know- 
ledge (with one exception) prevented it from getting farther. 
Now this view arises out of the examination of the language 
of the historians and geographers as examined in order, from 
Sallust to Ptolemy. 



clvi APPENDIX. 

Of Sallust and Cicero, the language points to Gaul as the 
home of the nation in question ; and that without the least 
intimation of its being any particularly distant portion of that 
country. " Per idem tempus adversus Gallos ab ducibus 
nostris, Q. Csepione et M. Manlio, male pugnatum — Marius 
consul absens factus, et ei decreta provincia Gallia. 11 — Bell. 
Jugurth. 114. " Ipse ille Marius — influentes in Italiam Gal- 
lorum maximas copias repressit." — Cicero de Prov. Consul. 13. 
And here an objection may be anticipated. It is undoubtedly 
true that even if the Cimbri had originated in a locality so 
distant as the Chersonese, it would have been almost impos- 
sible to have made such a fact accurately understood. Yet it 
is also true, that if any material difference had existed between 
the Cimbri and the Gauls of Gaul, such must have been fami- 
liarly known in Rome, since slaves of both sorts must there 
have been common. 

Cajsar, whose evidence ought to be conclusive (inasmuch as 
he knew of Germany as well as of Gaul), fixes them to the 
south of the Marne and Seine. This we learn, not from the 
direct text, but from inference : " Gallos — a Belgis Matrona et 
Sequana dividit." , " > — Bell. Gall. i. ] . " Belgas — solos esse qui, 
patrum nostrorum memoria, omni Gallia vexata, Teutones Cim- 
brosque intra fines suos ingredi prohibuerint. 11 — Bell. Gall. ii. 4. 
Now if the Teutones and Cimbri had moved from north to 
south, they would have clashed with the Belgse first, and with 
the other Gauls afterwards. The converse, however, was the 
fact. It is right here to state, that the last observation may 
be explained away by supposing either that the Teutones and 
Cimbri here meant may be a remnant of the confederation on 
their return, or else a portion that settled down in Gaul upon 
their way ; or finally, a division that made a circle towards 
the place of their destination in a south-east direction. None 
of these, however, seem the plain and natural construction ; 
and I would rather, if reduced to the alternative, read 
Germania instead of Gallia, than acquiesce in the most 
probable of them. 

Diodorus Siculus, without defining their locality, deals 
throughout with the Cimbri as a Gaulish tribe. Besides this, 
he gives us one of the elements of the assumed indistinctness 



APPENDIX. civil 

of ideas in regard to their origin, vim., their hypothetical con- 
nection with the Cimmerii. In this recognition of what might 
have been called the Cimmerian theory, he is followed by 
Strabo and Plutarch. — Diod. Sicul. v. 82. Strabo, vii. Plu- 
tarch. Vit. Marii. 

The next writer who mentions them is Strabo. In con- 
firmation of the view taken above, this author places the 
Cimbri on the northernmost limit of the area geographically 
known to him, viz., beyond Gaul and in Germany, between 
the Rhine and the Elbe : Tcov 8e Tep/j,dvcov, &>? elirov, ol fiev 
irpoaapKrioi Traprjicovcn ra> 'Q/ceava). Tvcopl^ovrai S' airo 
rcbv i/c§o\a>v rod 'Vtfvov ~kd§ovre<i rrjv apxh v ^XP 1 T °v 
"A\§to<;. Tovtcov 8e elal yvoopi/uicoTaroi ~2ovja/x§pol re /cal 
KljJL&poi. To. Se irepav rov "A\§io<; rd 7rpo? to5 ^Slfceava) 
iravrdiracnv dyvcocrra r]pJiv ecrrcv. — Lib. iv. Further proof 
that this was the frontier of the Roman world we get from 
the statement which soon follows, viz., that " thus much was 
known to the Romans from their successful wars, and that 
more would have been known had it not been for the injunc- 
tion of Augustus forbidding his generals to cross the Elbe." 
— Lib. iv. 

Velleius Paterculus agrees with his contemporary Strabo. 
He places them beyond the Rhine, and deals with them as 
Germans: — "Turn Cimbri et Teuton! transcendere Rhenum, 
multis mox nostris suisque cladibus nobiles. 1 " — ii. 8. " Effusa 
— immanis vis Germanarum gentium quibus nomen Cimbris ac 
Teutonis erat." — Ibid. 12. 

From the Germania of Tacitus a well-known passage will 
be considered in the sequel. Tacitus 1 s locality coincides with 
that of Strabo. 

Ptolemy. — Now the author who most mentions in detail the 
tribes beyond the Elbe is also the author who most pushes 
back the Cimbri towards the north. Coincident with his 
improved information as to the parts southward, he places 
them at the extremity of the area known to him : Kav^ot ol 
fiel^oves fieXP L T0 ^ &\§io<; irora/jbov' e<£e|^9 8e iirl avx^va 
r-fj'i Ki/JL&piKr]<; Xeptrovrfcrov Safoj/e?' aurrjv 8e TrjvXepaovTjaov 
virep fiev tou9 ~2d%ova<;, liiyovXcoves airo SvcrfjLcov etra 2a§a- 



clviii APPENDIX. 

\[<y<ytoi, ecra KoSavSoo' virep ov$Xd\oc teal ert virep tovtovs 
SvaficKcorepoL jxkv <£>ovv8ovcnoi, avaroXiKcorepoi Se Xapov&es, 
Trdvrcov Be apKTiKOirepoi KlfiSpoc. — Ptolernan Germania. 

Such is the evidence of those writers, Greek or Roman, who 
deal with the local habitation of the Oimbri rather than with 
the general history of that tribe. As a measure of the inde- 
finitude of their ideas, we have the confusion, already noticed, 
between the Cimbri and Cimmerii, on the parts of Diodorus, 
Strabo and Plutarch. A better measure occurs in the follow- 
ing extract from Pliny, who not only fixes the Cimbri in three 
places at once, but also (as far as we can find any meaning in 
his language) removes them so far northward as Norway : 
" Alteram genus Inggevones ; quorum pars Cimbri, Teutoni, ac 
Chan coram gentes. Proximi Rheno Istaevones ; quorum pars 
Cimbri mediterranei."" — iv. 28. " Promontorium Cimbrorum 
excurrens in maria longe peninsulam efficit, quae Cartris appel- 
latur." — Ibid. 27. " Sevo Mons (the mountain-chains of Nor- 
way) immanem ad Cimbrorum usque promontorium efficit 
sinum, qui Codanus vocatur, refertus insulis, quarum clarissima 
Scandinavia est, incompertse magnitudinis. 11 — Ibid. Upon 
confusion like this it is not considered necessary to expend 
further evidence. So few statements coincide, that under 
all views there must be a misconception somewhere ; and of 
such misconception great must the amount be, to become 
more improbable than a national migration from Jutland to 
Italy. 

Over and above, however, this particular question of evi- 
dence, there stands a second one ; viz. the determination of 
the ethnographical relations of the nations under considera- 
tion. This is the point as to whether the Cimbri conquered 
by Marius were Celts or Goths, akin to the Gauls, or akin to 
the Germans ; a disputed point, and one which, for its own 
sake only, were worth discussing, even at the expense of raising 
a wholly independent question. Such, however, it is not. If 
the Cimbri were Kelts, the improbability of their originating 
in the Cimbric Chersonese would be increased, and with it the 
amount of evidence required ; since, laying aside other consi- 
derations, the natural unlikelihood of a large area being tra- 
versed by a mass of emigrants is greatly enhanced by the fact 



APPENDIX. Clix 

of any intermediate portion of that area being possessed by 
tribes as alien to each other as the Gauls and Germans. Hence, 
therefore, the fact of the Cimbri being Kelts will (if proved) 
be considered as making against the probability of their origin 
in the Cimbric Chersonese ; whilst, if they be shown to be 
Goths, the difficulties of the supposition will be in some degree 
diminished. Whichever way this latter point is settled, some- 
thing will be gained for the historian ; since the supposed 
presence of Kelts in the Cimbric Chersonese has complicated 
more than one question in ethnography. 

Previous to proceeding in the inquiry, it may be well to lay 
down, once for all, as a postulate, that whatever, in the way 
of ethnography, is proved concerning any one tribe of the 
Cimbro-Teutonic league, must be considered as proved con- 
cerning the remainder ; since all explanations, grounded upon 
the idea that one part was Gothic and another part Keltic, 
have a certain amount of prima facie improbability to set 
aside. The same conditions as to the burden of proof apply 
also to any hypothesis founded on the notion of retiring Cimbri 
posterior to the attempted invasion of Italy. On this point 
the list of authors quoted will not be brought below the time 
of Ptolemy. With the testimonies anterior to that writer, 
bearing upon the question of the ethnography, the attempt, 
however, will be made to be exhaustive. Furthermore, as the 
question in hand is not so much the absolute fact as to whe- 
ther the Cimbri were Kelts or Goths, but one as to the amount 
of evidence upon which we believe them to be either the one 
or the other, statements will be noticed under the head of 
evidence, not because they are really proofs, but simply 
because they have ever been looked upon as such. Beginning 
then with the Germanic origin of the Cimbro-Teutonic confe- 
deration, and dealing separately with such tribes as are sepa- 
rately mentioned, we first find the 

Ambrones. — In the Anglo-Saxon poem called the Traveller's 
Song, there is a notice of a tribe called Ymbre, Ymbras, or 
Ymbran. Suhm, the historian of Denmark, has allowed him- 
self to imagine that these represent the Ambrones, and that 
their names still exists in that of the island Amron of the 
coast of Sleswick, and perhaps in Amerland, a part of Olden- 



clx APPENDIX. 

burg. — Thorpe's note on the Traveller's Song in the Codex 
Exoniensis. 

Teutones. — In the way of evidence of there being Teutones 
amongst the Germans, over and above the associate mention 
of their names with that of the Cimbri, there is but little. 
They are not so mentioned either by Tacitus or Strabo. 
Ptolemy, however, mentions a) the Teutonarii, b) the Teutones : 
TevrovodpcoL Kal Oulpovvoi — QapahetvaiV he Kal 2,vrj£a>v, 
TeuTove9 Kal "AfiapiroL. Besides this, however, arguments 
have been taken from a) the meaning of the rout teut = people 
(]>iuda, Moeso-Gothic ; \eod, Anglo-Saxon ; diot, Old High 
German : b) the saltus Teutobergius : c) the supposed con- 
nection of the present word Deut-sch = German with the 
classical word Teut-ones. These may briefly be disposed of. 

a.) It is not unlikely for an invading nation to call them- 
selves the nation, the nations, the people, &c. Neither, if the 
tribe in question had done so (presuming them to have been 
Germans or Goths), would the word employed be very unlike 
Teuton-es. Although the word \iud-a = nation or people, is 
generally strong in its declension (so making the plural \iud- 
6s), it is found also in a weak form with its plural thiot-un = 
Teuton-. See Deutsche Grammatik, i. 630. 

b.) The saltus Teutobergius mentioned by Tacitus (Ann. i. 
60) can scarcely have taken its name from a tribe, or, on the 
other hand, have given it to one. It means either the hill of 
the people, or the city of the people ; according as the syllable 
-berg- is derived from bdirgs = a hill, or from baurgs = a city. 
In either case the compound is allowable, e.g. diot-wec, public 
way, Old High German ; thwd-scatho, robber of the people, 
Old Saxon ; Ipeod-cyning, ]>e,od-mearc, boundary of the nation, 
Anglo-Saxon ; \\6d-land, tybd-vegr, people s way, Icelandic ; 
— Theud-tf-mVws, Yixewd-e-linda, Theud-{-^o^/io, proper names 
(from )>iud-) : himil-h'er&c, velt--perac, /W'Sw-perac, Old High 
German ; himinbiorg, valbiorg, Icelandic (from bdirgs = hill) 
— ascipurc, hasalipmc, saltzpurc, &c, Old High German 
(from baurgs = city) . The particular word diot-puruc = ci- 
vitas magna occurs in Old High German. — See Deutsche 
Grammatik, iii. p. 478. 

c.) Akin to this is the reasoning founded upon the connec- 



APPENDIX. clxi 

tion (real or supposed) between the root Teut- in Teuton-, and 
the root deut- in Deut-sch. It runs thus. The syllable in 
question is common to the word Teut-ones, Teut-onicus, Theod- 
iscus, teud-iscus, teut-iscus, tut-iske, dut-iske, tiut-sche, deut-sch ; 
whilst the word Deut-sch means German. As the Teut-ones 
were Germans, so were the Oimbri also. Now this line of 
argument is set aside by the circumstance that the syllable 
Teut- in Teut-ones and Teut-onicus, as the names of the con- 
federates of the Oimbri, is wholly unconnected with the Teut- 
on theod-iscus, and Deut-sch. This is fully shown by Grimm 
in his dissertation on the words German and Dutch. In its 
oldest form the latter word meant popular, national, verna- 
cular ; it was an adjective applied to the vulgar tongue, or the 
vernacular German, in opposition to the Latin. In the tenth 
century the secondary form Teut-onicus came in vogue even 
with German writers. Whether this arose out of imitation of 
the Latin form Bomanice, or out of the idea of an historical 
connection with the Teutones of the classics, is immaterial. 
It is clear that the present word Deut-sch proves nothing 
respecting the Teutones. Perhaps, however, as early as the 
time of Martial the word Teutonicus was used in a general 
sense, denoting the Germans in general. Certain it is that, 
before his time, it meant the particular people conquered by 
Marius, irrespective of origin or locality. — See Grimm 1 s 
Deutsche Grammatik, i. p. 17, 3rd edit. Martial, xiv. 26, 
Teutonici capilli. Claudian. in Eutrop. i. 406, Teutonicum 



The Cimbri. — Evidence to the Gothic origin of the Cimbri 
(treated separately) begins with the writers under Augustus 
and Tiberius. 

Veil. Paterculus. — The testimony of this writer as to the 
affinities of the nations in question is involved in his testimony 
as to their locality, and consequently subject to the same cri- 
ticism. His mention of them (as Germans) is incidental. 

Strabo. — Over and above the references already made, 
Strabo has certain specific statements concerning the Cimbri : 
a.) That according to a tradition (which he does not believe) 
they left their country on account of an inundation of the sea. 
This is applicable to Germany rather than to Gaul. This 

A A 



Clxii APPENDIX. 

liability to inundations must not, however, be supposed to 
indicate a locality in the Cimbric Chersonese as well as a 
German origin, since the coast between the Scheldt and Elbe 
is as obnoxious to the ocean as the coasts of Holstein, Sles- 
wick, and Jutland, b.) That against the German Cimbri and 
Teutones the Belgoe alone kept their ground — ware fiovovs 
(BeA/ya^) clvre^ecv Trpbs ti)v twv Tepfxdvwv ecpohov, KlfiSpcov 
Kal Tevrovcov. — iv. 3. This is merely a translation of Caesar 
(see above) with the interpolation Teppbdvwv. c.) That they 
inhabited their original country, and that they sent ambas- 
sadors to Augustus — Kal ydp vvv eyovat T7)v ydipav rjv elyov 
irporepov, Kal eirs/jb^rav too ^eoaaro) Bcopov tov lepcorarov 
irap avrols, XeSyjra, alrovpuevot (f)i\iav Kal dfivrjo-Tiav rwv 
V7rovp<yfiivcov' rv-^ovre^ he cov i)1~iovv dcfrypav. — Lib. i. Full 
weight must be given to the definite character of this state- 
ment. 

Tacitus. — Tacitus coincides with Strabo, in giving to the 
Cimbri a specific locality, and in stating special circumstances 
of their history. Let full weight be given to the words of a 
writer like Tacitus ; but let it also be remembered that he 
wrote from hearsay evidence, that he is anything rather than 
an independent witness, that his statement is scarcely recon- 
cilable with those of Ptolemy and Csesar, and that above all 
the locality which both he and Strabo give the Cimbri is 
also the locality of the Sicambri, of which latter tribe no 
mention is made by Tacitus,* although their wars with the 
Romans were matters of comparatively recent history. For 
my own part, I think, that between a confusion of the 
Cimbri with the Cimmerii on the one hand, and of the 
Cimbri with the Sicambri on the other, we have the clue to 
the misconceptions assumed at the commencement of the 
paper. There is no proof that in the eyes of the writers 
under the Republic, the origin of the Cimbri was a matter of 
either doubt or speculation. Catulus, in the History of his 
Consulship, commended by Cicero (Brutus, xxxv.), and 
Sylla in his Commentaries, must have spoken of them in a 
straightforward manner as Gauls, otherwise Cicero and 
Sallust would have spoken of them less decidedly. (See 

* This ought to be " by Tacitus in his Ger mania" — R. Gr. L. 1851. 



appendix. clxiii 

Plutarch's Life of Marius, and note). Confusion arose 
when. Greek readers of Homer and Herodotus began to 
theorize, and this grew greater when formidable enemies, 
under the name of Sicambri were found in Germany. It is 
highly probable that in both Strabo and Tacitus, we have a 
commentary on the lines of Horace — 
Te caede gaudentes Sicambri 
Compositis venerantur araris. 
" Eumdem (with the Chauci, Chatti, and Cherusci) Germanise 
situm proximi Oceano Cimbri tenent, parva nunc ci vitas, sed 
gloria ingens : veterisque famse late vestigia manent, utraque 
ripa castra ac spatia, quorum ambitu nunc quoque metiaris 
molem manusque gentis, et tarn magni exercitus fidem . . . occa- 
sione discordise nostra? et civil ium armorum, expugnatis 
legionum hibernis, etiam Gallias afFectavere ; ac rursus pulsi 
inde, proximis temporibus triumphati magis quam victi sunt." 
— German. 37. 

Justin. — Justin writes — " Simul e Germania Cimbros — 
inundasse Italiam." Now this extract would be valuable if we 
were sure that the word Germania came from Justin's original, 
Trogus Pompeius ; who was a Vocontian Gaul, living soon 
after the Cimbric defeat. To him, however, the term Ger- 
mania must have been wholly unknown ; since, besides 
general reasons, Tacitus says — " Germanise vocabulum recens 
et nuper additum : quoniam, qui primum Rhenum transgressi 
Gallos expulerint, ac nunc Tungri, tunc Germani vocati sint : 
ita nationis nomen, non gentis evaluisse paullatim, ut omnes, 
primum a victore ob metum, mox a seipsis invento nomine 
Germani vocarentur." Justin's interpolation of Germania 
corresponds with the similar one on the part of Strabo. 

Such is the evidence for the Germanic origin of the Cimbri 
and Teutones, against which may now be set the following 
testimonies as to their affinity with the Kelts, each tribe being 
dealt with separately. 

The Amhrones. — Strabo mentions them along with the 
Tigurini, an undoubted Celtic tribe — Kara rov 7rp6<i"A/jb§peova<; 
Kal Tcovyevous iroXefxov. 

Suetonius places them with the Transpadani — " per Am- 
bronas et Transpadanos." — Ceesar, § 9. 



clxiv APPENDIX. 

Plutarch mentions that their war-cries were understood 
and answered by the Ligurians. Now it is possible that the 
Ligurians were Kelts, whilst it is certain that they were not 
Goths. 

The Teutones. — Appian speaks of the Teutones having in- 
vaded Noricum, and this under the head KeXriKa. 

Floras calls one of the kings of the Teutones Teutobocchus, 
a name Keltic rather than Gothic. 

Virgil has the following lines : — 

Late jam turn ditione premebat 



Sarrastes populos, et qiue rigat sequora Sarnus ; 

Quique Rufras, Batulumque tenent, atquc aiva Cclennae ; 

Et quos maliferse despectant moenia Abellae : 

Teutonico ritu soliti torquere cateias. 

Tegmina qaeis capitum raptus dc subere cortex, 

iErataeque micant peltce, micat sereus ensis. — iEn. vii. 737 — 743. 

Now this word catela may be a provincialism from the neigh- 
bourhood of Sarraste. It may also (amongst other things) be 
a true Teutonic word. From what follows, it will appear 
that this latter view is at least as likely as any other. The 
commentators state that it is vox Celtica That this is true 
may be seen from the following forms — Irish : ga, spear, 
javelin; gaoth, ditto, a dart; goth, a spear (CReilly) ; gaothadh, 
a javelin ; gadh, spear ; gai, ditto ; crann gaidh, spear- 
shaft (Begly) — Cornish : geu, gew, gu, gui = lance, spear, 
javelin, shaft (Pryce) — Breton: goas, goaff (Rostremer). 

Considering the peculiarities of the Keltic pronunciation, 
this word cateia is perhaps the geesum of another part of 
Virgil, and the vaa-os of Appian, as well as the English 
word goad. 

The Cimbri — The Teutones. — Of either the Cimbri sepa- 
rately, or of the Cimbri and Teutones collectively, being of 
Gallic origin, we have, in the way of direct evidence, the 
testimonies exhibited above, viz., of Sallust, Cicero, Caesar, 
Diodorus. To this may be added, that of Dion Cassius, who 
not only had access to the contemporary accounts which 
spoke of them as Gauls, but also was enabled to use them 
critically, being possessed of information concerning Germany 
as well as France. 



APPENDIX. clxv 

Of Appian the whole evidence goes one way, viz., that the 
tribes in question were Gauls. His expressions are : 7r\el- 
crrov re Kal ixa^ijJbOiTaTOV — j^prffxa Ke\T(ov et? rr)v ^IraXiav 
Kal tt]v TaXariav elcreSaXe.* — iv. 2. In his book on Illyria 
he states, that the Kelts and Cimbri, along with the Illyrian 
tribe of the Autariae, had, previous to the battle against 
Marius, attacked Delphi and suffered for their impiety. 
— IXXvp. 8'. 4. 

Quintilian may be considered to give us upon the subject 
the notions of two writers — -Virgil, and either Caesar or 
Crassus. In dealing, however, with the words of Quintilian, 
it will be seen that there are two assumptions. That either 
Caesar or Crassus considered the Cimbri to be Gauls, we infer 
from the following passage : " Rarum est autem, ut oculis 
subjicere contingat (sc. vituperationem), ut fecit C. Julius, qui 
cum Helvio Mancise saepius obstrepenti sibi diceret, jam osten- 
dam, quails sis : isque plane instaret interrogatione, qualem 
se tandem osteiisurus esset, digito demonstravit imaginem 
Galli in scuto Mariano Cimbrico pictam, cui Mancia turn 
simillimus est visus. Tabernae autem erant circum Forum, ac 
scutum illud signi gratia positum." — Inst. Orat. vi. 3, 38. 
Pliny tells the story of Crassus (xxxix. 4). Although in this 
passage the word upon which the argument turns has been 
written galli, and translated cock, the current interpretation is 
the one given above. — Vid. not. ed. Gesner. 

In the same author is preserved the epigram of Virgil's 
called Catalecta, and commented on by Ausonius of Bordeaux. 
Here we learn that T. Annius Cimber was a Gaul ; whilst it 
is assumed that there was no other reason to believe that he 
was called Cimber than that of his being descended from 
some slave or freedman of that nation : — " Non appareat 
afFectatio, in quam mirifice Virgilius, 

Corinthiorum amator iste verborum 
Ille iste rhetor : namque quatenus totus 
Thucydides Britarmus, Atticse febres, 
Taw-Gallicum, min-, al- spinee male illisit. 
Ita omnia ista verba miscuit fratri. 

Cimber hie fuit a quo fratrem necatum hoc Ciceronis dictum 



clxvi APPENDIX. 

notatura est ; Germanum Cimber occidit" — Inst. Orat. viii. 3. 

cum not. 

Die, quid significant Catalecta Maronis '? in his al- 

Celtarum posuit, sequitur non lucidius tuu-, 

Et quod Germano mistum male letiferum min-. — Auson. 

Undoubtedly the pronunciation here ridiculed is that of 
the Gauls, and it is just possible, that in it is foreshadowed 
the curtailed form that the Latin tongue in general puts on in 
the French. Again, the slave whose courage failed him when 
ordered to slay Caius Marius, is called both a Gaul and a 
Cimbrian by Plutarch, as well as by Lucan. In the latter 
writer, we have probably but a piece of rhetoric. — Pharsalia, 
lib. ii. 

Amongst tribes undoubtedly Gallic, the Nervii claimed de- 
scent from the Teutones and Cimbri. The passage of Tacitus 
that connects the Nervii with the Germans, connects them also 
with the Treviri. Now a well-known passage in St. Jerome 
tells us that the Treviri were Gauls: — NepQiot rjaav Be 
KifiSpwv Kal Tevrovwv arro'yovoi. — Appian, iv. 1, 4. "Tre- 
viri et Nervii circa aftectationem Gerrnanicae originis ultro 
ambitiosi sunt, tamquam per banc gloriam sanguinis, a 
similitudine et inertia Gallorum separentur.'' 1 — German. 28. 
Finally, in the Life of Marius by Plutarch, we have dialogues 
between the Cimbri and the Romans. Now a Gallic inter- 
preter was probable, but not so a German one. 

Such are the notices bearing upon the ethnography of the 
Cimbri. Others occur, especially amongst the poets ; of 
these, little or no use can be made, for a reason indicated 
above. Justin speaks of embassies between Mithridates and 
the Cimbri. Suetonius connects the Cimbri with the Gallic 
Senones ; he is writing, however, about Germany, so that his 
evidence, slight as it is, is neutralized. Theories grounded 
upon the national name may be raised on both sides ; Cimbri 
may coincide with either the Germanic kempa = a warrior or 
champion, or with the Keltic Cymry = Cambrians. Equally 
equivocal seem the arguments drawn from the descriptions 
either of their physical conformation or their manners. The 
silence of the Gothic traditions as to the Cimbri being Ger- 
manic, proves more in the way of negative evidence than the 



APPENDIX. clxvii 

similar silence of the Keltic ones, since the Gothic legends are 
the most numerous, and the most ancient. Besides this, they 
deal very especially with genealogies, national and individual. 
The name of Bojorix, a Oimbric king mentioned in Epitome 
Liviana (Ixvii.), is Keltic rather than Gothic, although in the 
latter dialects proper names ending in -ric (Alaric, Genseric) 
frequently occur. 

Measuring the evidence, which is in its character essen- 
tially cumulative, consisting of a number of details unimport- 
ant in themselves, but of value when taken in the mass, the 
balance seems to be in favour of the Cimbri, Teutones and 
Ambrones being Gauls rather than Germans, Kelts rather 
than Goths. 

An argument now forthcoming stands alone, inasmuch as it 
seems to prove two things at once, viz., not only the Keltic 
origin of the Cimbri, but, at the same time, their locality in 
the Chersonese. It is brought forward by Dr. Pritchard, in 
his Physical History of Mankind, and runs as follows: — 
(a.) It is a statement of Pliny that the sea in their neighbour- 
hood was called by the Cimbri Morimarusa, or the dead sea = 
mare mortuum. (b.) It is a fact, that in Keltic Welsh mor 
marwth = mare mortuum, morimarusa, dead sea. Hence the 
language of the Cimbric coast is to be considered as Keltic. 
Now the following facts im T alidate this conclusion: — (1.) 
Putting aside the contradictions in Pliny's statement, the 
epithet dead is inapplicable to either the German Ocean or 
the Baltic. (2.) Pliny's authority was a writer named Phile- 
mon : out of the numerous Philemons enumerated by 
Fabricius, it is likely that the one here adduced was a con- 
temporary of Alexander the Great ; and it is not probable 
that at that time glosses from the Baltic were known in the 
Mediterranean. (3.) The subject upon which this Philemon 
wrote was the Homeric Poems. This, taken along with the 
geography of the time, makes it highly probable that the 
original Greek was not K(fi§poi, but Ki/nfiepioi ; indeed we 
are not absolutely sure of Pliny having written Cimbri. (4.) 
As applied to Cimmerian sea the epithet dead was applicable. 
(5.) The term Morimarusa = mare mortuum, although good 
Keltic, is better Slavonic, since throughout that stock of Ian- 



clxviii APPENDIX. 

guages, as in many other of the Indo-European tongues (the 
Keltic and Latin included), the roots mor and mori mean sea 
and dead respectively: — " Septemtrionalis Oceanus, Amal- 
chium eum Hecatseus appellat, a Paropamiso amne, qua 
Scythiam alluit, quod nomen ejus gentis lingua significat con- 
gelatum, Philemon 3Iorimarusam'' i a Cimbris (qu. Clmmeriis) 
vocari scribit : hoc est mare mortuum usque ad promontorium 
Rubeas, ultra deinde Cronivm " (13). 

One point, however, still remains : it may be dealt with 
briefly, but it should not be wholly overlooked, viz., the ques- 
tion, whether, over and above the theories as to the location of 
the Cimbri in the Cimbric Chersonese, there is .reason to be- 
lieve, on independent grounds, that Keltic tribes were the early 
inhabitants of the peninsula in question ? If such were 
actually the case, all that has preceded would, up to a certain 
point, be invalidated. Now I know no sufficient reasons for 
believing such to be the case, although there are current in 
ethnography many insufficient ones. 

1. In the way of philology, it is undoubtedly true that words 
common to the Keltic tribes occur in the Danish of Jutland, 
and in the Frisian and Low German of Sleswick and Hol- 
stein ; but there is no reason to consider that they belong to 
an aboriginal Keltic tribe. The a priori probability of Kelts 
in the peninsula involves hypotheses in ethnography which 
are, to say the least, far from being generally recognised. 
The evidence as to the language of aborigines derived from 
the significance of the names of old geographical localities, is 
wanting for the Cimbric Chersonese. The arguments as to 
the origin from Jutland of certain Keltic tribes in England 
(e.g., the Picts) either rest upon the historical evidence 
that has just been discussed, or else involve a vicious circle of 
argument. 

2. No traditions, either Scandinavian or German, point 
towards an aboriginal Keltic population for the localities in 
question. 

3. There are no satisfactory proofs of such in either 
archaeology or natural history. A paper noticed by Dr. 
Pritchard of Professor Eschrichfs upon certain tumuli in 

* Query. Murmora= Propontis (R. G. L. 1851). 



APPENDIX. clxix 

Jutland states, that the earliest specimens of art (anterior to 
the disco veiy of metals), as well as the character of the 
tumuli themselves, have a Keltic character. He adds, however, 
that the character of the tumuli is as much Siberian as Keltic. 
The early specimens of art are undoubtedly like similar 
specimens found in England. It happens, however, that such 
things are in all countries more or less alike. In Professor 
Siebold's museum at Leyden, stone-axes from tumuli in 
Japan and Jutland, are laid side by side, for the sake of 
comparison, and between them there is no perceptible dif- 
ference. The oldest skulls in these tumuli are said to be 
other than Gothic. They are, however, Finnic rather than 
Keltic. 

4. The statement in Tacitus (Germ. 44.), that a nation on 
the Baltic, called the iEstii, spoke a language somewhat akin 
to the British, cannot be considered as conclusive to the ex- 
istence of Kelts in the north of Germany. Any language, 
not German, would probably so be denoted. Such might 
exist in the mother-tongue of either the Lithuanic or the 
Esthonian. 

It is considered that in the foregoing pages, the following 
propositions are either proved or involved: — 1. That the 
Oimbri, conquered by Marius, came from either Gaul or 
Switzerland, and that they were Kelts. 2. That the Teutones 
and Ambrones were equally Keltic with the Cimbri. 3. That 
no nation north of the Elbe was known to Republican Rome. 
4. That there is no evidence of Keltic tribes ever having 
existed north of the Elbe. 5. That the epithet Cimhrica 
applied to the Ohersonesus, proves nothing more in respect to 
the inhabitants of that locality, than is proved by words like 
West Indian and North- American Indian. 6. That in the 
word cateia we are in possession of a new Keltic gloss. 7. 
That in the term Morimarusa we are in possession of a gloss 
at once Cimmerian and Slavonic. 8. That for any positive 
theory as to the Cimbro-Teutonic league, we have at present 
no data, but that the hypothesis that would reconcile the 
greatest variety of statements, would run thus : — viz., that 
an organized Keltic confederation conterminous with the 
Belgse, the Ligurians, and the Helvetians descended with its 

B B 



clxx APPENDIX. 

eastern divisions upon Noricum, and with its western ones 
upon Provence. 

Note (1851). 
Some change in my opinion concerning the populations in 
question, since the publication of the preceding paper, has 
taken place. The conflicting difficulties have increased with 
the increase of the attention that has been bestowed on the 
subject. Hence, I modify the last proposition, and hesitate 
to commit myself to the doctrine, that the Cimbro-Teutons 
were Gauls at all ; what they were, being a greater mystery 
than ever. Neither do I now consider their political rela- 
tions to each other, as anything more than prima facie 
evidence of ethnological affinity; in other words, I am less 
satisfied, that the Ciuibri and Teutones are referable to the 
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